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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;moreotherstuff, post: 393900, member: 56&quot;]Most of the research was genealogical, wasn&#039;t it?&nbsp; It&#039;s that 7-degrees-of-separation thing.</p><p><br /></p><p>I wonder if the painting was ever cleaned.&nbsp; That&#039;s when signature changes tend to happen.</p><p><br /></p><p>Could be that the first initial was partial, so someone decided to &quot;strengthen&quot; it.</p><p><br /></p><p>With both painters named Chase, it&#039;s possible that someone knew of the one, but not the other.&nbsp; I think William Merritt is the better known of the two, which is to say: I&#039;ve heard of him.&nbsp; I can&#039;t say I&#039;ve heard of Harry, but if I have, I&#039;ve probably lumped the two together.&nbsp;&nbsp; William Merritt likely commands the higher prices.</p><p><br /></p><p>All conjecture, of course.</p><p><br /></p><p>As the painting was not being offered for sale, there was little incentive to forge the signature for monetary gain.</p><p><br /></p><p>There is a 4 volume (at least) catalog of William Merritt&#039;s work published by Yale, so there are experts.&nbsp; I haven&#039;t found anything on Harry. I don&#039;t know how this painting would pass muster.&nbsp; A guess would be that authorship was never questioned.&nbsp; The gallery just took the donor&#039;s attribution at face value.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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