There’s plenty going on in the world of classic art these days, with a few stories making headlines around the world.

A few weeks ago we covered the story of two Vincent van Gogh paintings rescued from the Italian mafia (HERE), with the artworks in question described as ‘priceless’.

In this story there is a price, although it’s not one auctioneer giants Sotheby’s will be happy seeing splashed across papers and news sites the world over.

What’s worse is that the $10 million figure might just be the tip of the iceberg. We’ll head to the Daily Beast for a few key points:

[Sotheby’s] was forced into a humiliating admission that it is at the center [sic] of a multimillion-pound forgery scandal, involving what could be tens of millions of dollars worth of bogus Old Master paintings.

Specifically, a painting authenticated by Sotheby’s as the work of Dutch artist Frans Hals [an example of Hals’ work below] —and sold on that basis for almost $10 million—has now been “reassessed” by the auction house and declared a fake.

Sotheby’s released a statement saying that a new “technical analysis” had revealed that the work was a “forgery.” The sale was annulled and the client—believed to be an American collector based in Seattle—was reimbursed, Sotheby’s said.

In other words, the gallery was comprehensively hoodwinked. Even worse, however, is that now the authenticity of up to $200 million-worth of other Old Masters which allegedly appeared across European galleries from the same source—a little known French collector—is under question.