Heard it a few times and it certainly seems like something that would happen but is there any proof or real world examples?
Can an Appraiser just make something worth $20m based purely on their say so?
EDIT: Thanks some great replies! and yeah i was asking more about the tax evasion part than the 'modern art is bad lol' angle.
Well, some artists are precisely that. I remember meeting this cool cat from Austria. Then I saw his art. It was stuff like you'd make in fifth grade art class with construction paper, with little windows you could open, like a pop-up book. And all of it monochrome, in fifty shades of gray. It was literally something a kid could make. Yet he was a real artist, I looked up his website. Works for sale at museums and such.