Looking at the exquisite paintings that didn't look like real ones, another old man nodded in agreement.
This batch of porcelain made by Chen Wenzhe is as beautiful as fake.
This sounds like a contradiction, but it is true.
The counterfeiters on the market are all as beautiful as the porcelain in front of them, but those porcelains cannot withstand scrutiny.
As long as you have a little knowledge, you can see the flaws, and these beautiful ones in front of you are like replicas of porcelain, no matter how you look at it, you can't see any problems.
If something is beautiful and looks fake, it is really fake, but what is in front of you is obviously not.
This is mainly the pastel porcelain produced by the Jingzhen Royal Kiln Factory during the Yong and Qian Dynasties. The level of craftsmanship is really high.
Most people, if nothing else, can't draw a painting, let alone whether the glaze required for the painting is suitable!
Many of Chen Wenzhe's imitation porcelains have been auctioned by Sotheby's before.
For example, the recently made white ground pastel bat peach-pattern olive vase "Made by the Yongzheng Emperor", and the previously hand-made pastel plum vase "Made by the Qianlong Emperor", all of which were sold for more than 40 million yuan.
In recent years, the market price of pastel porcelain has continued to rise, and its collection potential has increased day by day. People have paid more and more attention to it and welcomed it, so that there are more and more high imitations.
Therefore, in recent years, fewer and fewer people are willing to spend money to purchase goods, and they are becoming more and more cautious.
This is the difficulty with high imitation, people who want it can't find the real good stuff.
People who want to sell can't find a good channel to do so.
That is to say, Chen Wenzhe, who has a slight reputation, can still use purple clay pots as a breakthrough. Otherwise, he has to rely solely on porcelain making to achieve financial freedom. Who knows how long it will take!
As for other domestic porcelain craftsmen, they should not be easily confused if they are not famous.
Not to mention other things, just the various counterfeit porcelains on the market can realize the process of expelling good money from bad money.
The main reason is that the cost of counterfeiting is too low, such as the launch of a new counterfeiting method, printed decals.
The kind of things we see so far are just like the fake paintings that are flooding the market. They are extremely low-cost and very beautiful.
You can take medicine for a few hundred yuan, but if you spend 4-5 figures, the dealer will probably laugh out loud.
Imagine that you still need to copy a fake painting, but now?
You can just screen print it, or you can even take a photo and copy it. The result will be exactly the same as the real thing.
The batch of porcelain made by Chen Wenzhe in front of me, not to mention other things, is just a painting level, which is enough to impress two old professionals!
Comparing the patterns one by one, the two old men became more and more satisfied with the works made by Chen Wenzhe.
Because not only did they not see any flaws, but they also saw more advantages.
Let’s talk about the simplest thing. I don’t talk about whether the decoration is good or not, just the layout of the decoration and some small details. Most people can’t do it to the current level.
A piece of porcelain is planned from the beginning to the completion.
For example, in terms of decoration, each piece of porcelain has a different size, as well as the number of decorations laid out on it.
Especially in some special periods, such as the Kangxi, Yongzheng, and Qianlong dynasties, if no one points out the characteristics of some decorative patterns, you will never know.
And why are these three dynasties said to be special periods?
Because the official kiln porcelain of these three dynasties is very good, it cannot be said that there are very few, but not many, that have been handed down to the present, so the price is very expensive, so it is special.
Gu Yao
Many people know the characteristics of the porcelain of that era.
Many people make high imitations, fine imitations, and imitations that also have these characteristics.
For example, in the early Yongzheng period, there was the Kangxi multicolor style, with pastel decorations mostly painted with flowers, butterflies, bats with eight peaches (meaning blessings and longevity), flowers on branches, narcissus and Ganoderma lucidum, ladies, Magu offering birthdays, baby plays, etc.
The decorations are obviously sparse and regular. These are basic skills, just learn to imitate them little by little.
For example, the pastel peach and bat plate is painted with peach branches, leaves and peaches starting from the outer wall of the plate, passing through the mouth of the plate to the center of the plate, where the peach branches, leaves and bats are painted.
Whether the imitation is good or not depends entirely on your ability. If your painting is good, your porcelain making technology is good, and the materials you use are up to standard, the final fired product will be good.
If there is some qualified distressing craftsmanship, this is a high imitation.
If it has top-notch distressing craftsmanship, it is a fine imitation and can be sold as a genuine item.
However, in this counterfeiting process, there are often some small details that can make your carefully crafted porcelain look fake at first glance.
This involves the role of reading. Many things are not even recorded in official history, but they do exist. Maybe this is just a small habit.
But later, someone did some research and found that it was indeed true, which was interesting.
Or let’s talk about the previous pastel plate with peach and bat branches. This is just a plate with branches on the wall, and then there are peaches and bats. How difficult is it?
If ordinary people were to imitate it, it would not be difficult. At most, it would just be a matter of the quality of the painting.
However, for real masters, if they want to imitate the top quality official kiln, they must be careful.
One of the simplest problems is that the official kiln fruit bat pattern porcelain in the Yongzheng period usually painted 8 peaches, but during the Qianlong period, there were more than 9 peaches, so there is a saying of "Yong Ba Qian Jiu".
Simple, right? Just pay a little attention to the layout. When imitating Yongzheng porcelain, eight peaches are painted on the surface of the porcelain, while when imitating Qianlong period porcelain, nine are painted.
It's easy to say, as long as you know it, you can't make a mistake.
The most important thing is that you need to know. What if you don’t know?
What eight or nine is pure nonsense!
There are a lot of people like this, they make high imitations, they just cover their heads and make random things.
After all, how many real experts are there in the market? If you don’t even know, why don’t you just let them create what you want?
However, it is different when entering the high-end market. Because of their own interests, a large group of people have spent their time studying ancient official kilns. Any flaws or mistakes will be magnified.
Let’s talk about the porcelain with fruit bat pattern on wall branches from the third dynasty of the Qing Dynasty. The bats painted by Yongzheng Chao have hooks at the top of their wings, a point in the hook, and hair on the mouth (but not absolutely).
The figures of ladies and children are smaller, with delicate faces, and may have a sparse background of mountains, rocks and trees, or may leave more blank space.
The exquisite work is also above the decoration, with corresponding poems and songs inscribed in running script in ink and color, and red greetings or corner seals, showing the elegance of the literati in the society at that time.
Through these characteristics, we can initially judge the year of this pastel.
This is very important, because porcelain from many eras has this characteristic of subtle details that can be seen in articles.
For example, the first fine porcelain that Chen Wenzhe came into contact with was 7501 porcelain.
There are some subtleties in the production process of this kind of porcelain, which are different from the 7801feng porcelain. It is also a matter of ups and downs, strokes and strokes.
This refers to painting habits, vessel shapes, patterns, etc.
Compared with craftsmanship, painting habits are insignificant, right? But if you don’t pay attention and don’t respect the habits of the craftsmen of the past, then no matter how beautiful your imitation is and its artistic value is high, it will not be considered a high imitation!