Last year we visited the house where Napoleon was held on the island of Elba. At the carpark was a so called italian artist accompanied by a woman from the south of England. He said that as an artist he had studied in Rome this was confirmed by the woman. We bought two paintings from him without really giving them some close scrutiny. They were wrapped up and on our return to the UK we examined them and found them to be no more than pictures from a magazine with a stuck on border which he had signed. It was only when we took them out of the frames that this all became apparent.