Alfredo Martinez lived on New York City’s margins, a squatter who shook off one eviction after another. He was an artist who usually lacked a gallery and sometimes put on exhibits in a storage locker. Yet Mr. Martinez was also a player in the world capital of culture and media. Mr. Martinez synthesized those qualities into an idiosyncratic strategy as a bohemian provocateur: Use prison to supercharge an art career. He did that in the early 2000s, after he pleaded guilty to art forgery.

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Persons: Alfredo Martinez, Martinez, Anna Sorokin Locations: New York