Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Maurice Cloud

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. MBisanz ^talk 12:01, 12 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Maurice Cloud (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)

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This is an interesting article because I found absolutely nothing to confirm he existed and instead I found links for other people with this name here including one "Firbankian" in the 1980s (after this Maurice Cloud allegedly died in 1973) and all my other searches found absolutely nothing. It's also interesting to note an artist from this time would at least have had a French Wiki article but there is not and this has hardly changed since October 2008 so that's casts more questions at this article. Pinging TheGGoose and Calamondin12 and notifying past users Gmatsuda, Oo7565 and DGG. SwisterTwister talk 05:40, 27 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of People-related deletion discussions. SwisterTwister talk 05:43, 27 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Arts-related deletion discussions. SwisterTwister talk 05:43, 27 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of France-related deletion discussions. SwisterTwister talk 05:43, 27 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment. This is a perplexing case. As noted above, no French Wikipedia article exists for the subject, nor have any reliable French sources been found. The article was created by an account with no other edits, and subsequently edited by a user who had nearly no edit history outside this article and, one year later, attempted three times to blank the page with the edit summary "Content no longer accurate or relevant." (Further history on the background of this incident appears at User talk:Craig~enwiki.) The article contains deliberately vague statements: "no trace in writing on his interests nor his favorite painters" and the like. These are all classic symptoms of a hoax. Yet the artist is named on a few seemingly credible places online. The list starts with the website of the Richard Norton Gallery in Chicago, which shows seven paintings attributed to Cloud and states that they were part of an exhibition in November and December 2012. There's also a subsequent Cloud exhibition ("Works on Paper"), listed by the gallery in 2015. Another Cloud painting is pictured in a New York blog from 2009, and still another one is at the Magen H Gallery in New York. But no mention of the artist Maurice Cloud antedating the Wikipedia article has yet appeared anywhere - which would be bizarre for an artist of even slight significance who died in 1973, had work commissioned by the French government, received "much attention from the press," and had exhibitions in Paris and elsewhere. Clearly, something isn't adding up here, and this deserves further attention. Calamondin12 (talk) 13:19, 27 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
• The part that might be sourceable is the murals on the ocean liners. I haven;t found anything yet, however. DGG ( talk ) 15:54, 27 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep [1] "AskArt.com" is a reliable source AFAICT. Collect (talk) 00:07, 28 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete. that source shows existence, not notability. DGG ( talk ) 18:32, 30 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • I think the connection to Crevel is pretty noteworthy, and the link to surrealism. Usually I find anyone who gets a big bio at AskArt is "notable enough" for Wikipedia purposes. And he definitely did exist <g>. BTW, the Firbankian is "Maurice B. Cloud" so not the same at all.Collect (talk) 21:38, 30 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep and move to George Maurice Cloud. I found sources under that name, which seems to be used more consistently. I think he was known under "Georges Maurice Cloud" & signed his works as "G. Maurice Cloud", & that means that a search only under Maurice Cloud would have been insufficient.

("Georges Maurice Cloud" OR "G. Maurice Cloud") -site:en.wikipedia.org - Google Search

Peaceray (talk) 03:17, 2 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• WP:Copyvio - Large portions of the article appear to be copied directly from the Papillon Gallery site. Or maybe they were copied the other way, in which case it becomes a dubious source. --Bejnar (talk) 18:15, 4 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete (1) lack of significant coverage in independent sources and (2) as a copyright violation. The sources are galleries trying to sell his works, and not independent. While one gallery called him "well-known", another gallery called him an "undiscovered" artist. It is all hype. --Bejnar (talk) 18:24, 4 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.