In art authentication and attribution, the overall goal is to confirm whether a particular piece of art P is what it is claimed or thought to be. The claim O is likely to be an original work by a particular artist A. Consequently, the essential modus operandi in art authentication is the collection of information I P about P to compare with the known (and, possibly, yet to be determined) information I O and I A about O and A. The art P is often a painting, which is the current assumption, however, it can be a sculpture or pottery, in fact any artwork or antiquity, and, occasionally, a tapestry or a tablecloth. The connection to inverse problems comes via (a) the collection of the information I P and I O , (i.e. the collection of information about the work in question, and about securely provenanced works by the artist in question),and (b) the optimization of the comparison of I P with I O and A in order to have a strategy that maximizes the confirmation that P is a forgery when that is the situation.