Riding the wind of rebirth

"Yes, it doesn't conform to the logic of fraud at all..." Ma Ye nodded in agreement, then he was stunned: "It doesn't conform to the logic of fraud, so it's possible, it's possible..."

"It may be authentic, but it is more likely to be a fabrication." Zhou Zhi said, "Don't forget, many of the products on the stalls outside are fabricated without any care. Even the Wuzhu Tongbao can be found. Do you believe it?"

Everyone couldn't help but burst into laughter.

"So this is the biggest difficulty in porcelain identification. For some authentic pieces that are unique, we can only regretfully doubt them. As long as there is a feature on the porcelain that we have never seen before, we will treat it as a fake. Even if we miss the authentic piece, at least we have saved our cash."

"Yes, that's why no one dares to touch this plate." Ma Ye said, "The bottom is a pastel painting, and there is a date stamped on top. Has anyone seen it?"

Everyone looked at each other and shook their heads.

"I have seen it." Zhou Zhi smiled and said, "Not only have I seen it, it is almost exactly the same."

"Ah? Where have you seen him?" Ma Ye was surprised and asked quickly.

"When the two old men were in the National Cultural Relics Appraisal Working Group, they wrote a report entitled "Guidelines for the Appraisal of Some Domestic Porcelains with Pastel-Royal Colors and Vermilion-Red Dates and Bottom Marks."

"Weren't the two old men from the calligraphy and painting group at the time? How could they write such a report?"

"Isn't it because of the misunderstanding we just encountered? The old idea of ​​judging the fake by nine true and one false is at work, which led the Jilin Cultural Relics Store to identify a batch of porcelain with this type of bottom pattern as imitations made during the Republic of China."

"After the two old men discovered this problem, they rescued the batch of porcelain and wrote a work report to remind all units to pay attention to similar situations."

"Their basis is that the Palace Museum has more than a dozen pieces of porcelain with this type of bottom mark. The pieces are not large, mostly saucers, tea balls, and small ornaments. They are generally monochrome on the outside, with white inside and bottom with pastel colors. Two-thirds of the bottom marks have cinnabar-printed four-character dates added to them."

"The two old men also specifically reminded us that although the craftsmanship, painting, carving and glaze of these small porcelains are extremely exquisite, the handwriting is not like that of official kilns, and asked everyone to pay special attention to this point."

"Where did you see this guide?"

"This material was included in the 1983 Working Group Annual Report." Zhou Zhi was also somewhat amused: "It's just the annual report of the calligraphy and painting group. I don't know whether this guideline was finally passed on."

"Of course not." Ma Ye was puzzled. "Why did you think of reading the 1983 Cultural Relics Working Group Annual Report?"

"Follow the map." Zhou Zhi said, "I have been entrusting Brother Fei and Sister Wanqiu to collect old paintings from various arts and crafts academies. Many of the ancient paintings identified by the working group back then are now collected in the National Museum of China. And because of historical reasons, a batch of them were allocated to various arts and crafts academies to earn foreign exchange, so those annual reports are important clues."

"Yes, I've heard you talk about this." Master Ma nodded.

"This batch of porcelain is extremely rare," Zhou Zhi said. "The pieces from the Palace Museum and Shenyang together are less than 20 in total, and they are all small pieces. They are usually not exhibited. Even if they are exhibited, only the front is shown, and the bottom is not shown to the public."

"I have handled quite a few porcelains in the National Museum, especially the less popular ones, which everyone pays special attention to." Ma Ye said, "Why haven't I seen these porcelains in the West Second Storehouse?"

The museum's warehouses all have strict management measures. In addition to the cumbersome entry and exit regulations, there are specific requirements for air purification, disinfection, smoke, liquid detection, fire extinguishing, monitoring, temperature control, humidity control, cold light sources, etc.

For example, the warehouse for displaying calligraphy and paintings is called the paper cultural relic warehouse, the temperature should be 20 degrees, the humidity should be between 50% and 60%, while the warehouse for storing porcelain and pottery is called the silicate material cultural relic warehouse, the humidity should be lowered to 40% to 60%, and the rest such as animal materials, metal materials, etc. are all different. The West Second Warehouse is a large warehouse, mainly storing pottery, porcelain, and stoneware.

"Because they are not in the West Second Warehouse. They were loaned to the Ceramic Research Institute of the Ministry of Light Industry in 1985 and should be in Jingdezhen now."

"An important part of ceramic authenticity identification is identifying the 'Ministry of Light Industry' mark. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, craftsmen were obsessed with imitating the marks of the Kangxi, Yongzheng and Qianlong dynasties. It is estimated that this transfer was also related to making good imitations for export and earning foreign exchange."

"Such a precious thing, and you haven't returned it after borrowing it for ten years?" Ma Ye immediately expressed his dissatisfaction.

"That makes sense. The National Museum has borrowed items from museums around the country for more than a decade and hasn't returned them yet, right?"

"This is different. I still have to follow the old man..."

"I've already told them. Master Ma, please take the things back to show the old man. This will also be a reminder to them."

"Scarce items like these that have been passed down in an orderly manner can easily be lost in the market and then damaged due to lack of attention. Compared with other common cultural relics, they need more protection."

"Ah? Why didn't you give it to the old man?"

"Xiao Miao and I will go to Gome in a while. They are holding a Hundred Flowers Award exhibition there. The Hundred and Eight Dragons carved by Chuannan Hong just won the gold medal. We have to go and congratulate the masters of Suzhou Jade Carving Factory."

"Brother, do you have any idea about Sichuan red?" The man who just brought stir-fried liver to Zhou Zhi's eyes lit up: "We can talk about this..."

6◇9◇Book◇Bar

"These are the same as what Master Ma said." Zhou Zhi pulled Mai Xiaomiao up and put the few items he found on the table. "These snuff bottles are for the two old men. Master Ma, give me the car keys. Xiao Miao and I will leave first."

"Wipe your mouth." Master Ma handed the key to Zhou Zhi and reminded him.

After Zhou Zhi and Mai Xiaomiao left, everyone started talking: "Was everything he just said true? And then he just left the plate?"

"If this is real, it's a rare item from the Yongzheng period, three thousand yuan..." Someone couldn't help but slap his thigh in frustration when he said this: "This is not a lot of money, I should have taken it first!"

"There are still a lot of these half-truths on the stalls outside. You still have time to go now." Someone immediately made fun of him, saying, "You need to be able to fish chestnuts out of the fire and find gold in the sand."

"Master Ma, who is this young master?"

Ma Ye picked up the small plate and looked at the inscription carefully: "It is true that you can fish for chestnuts in the fire and look for gold in the sand. If you really want to find something that is almost certain to win in the antique city, it is not enough to just have knowledge of antiques or just hang around in the market."

"Those working in the Palace Museum and the National Museum have good eyesight, but not sharp enough. If you put an authentic piece in front of them, they can give a lot of analysis, from the clay to the shape to the pattern to the glaze, each of which has a lot of details. But if you mix this authentic piece with nine imitations and ask them to choose, they will think there are problems here and there, and they will definitely not dare to buy it."

"On the other hand, for those who have been in the antique market for a long time, there are actually not many opportunities to get good goods. Most of the time, they are ordinary or defective. Even if you go to the National Museum or the Forbidden City, there is still a distance between them and there is a layer of glass in between, so it is almost impossible to get a chance to personally examine and judge."

"And there are many places that we can't see at all, such as this plate." Ma Ye carefully placed the plate on the table in the normal way: "In the National Museum of China, this is a standard official kiln rouge purple painted pink Laifu plate. Who would have guessed that there is a broken branch of longevity peaches under it, and a four-character cinnabar date mark on it?!" (End of this chapter)