Jianbao life

Chapter 682
Meng Yi first put the two boxes on the table, and Zhu Dafu asked, "Xiao Meng, what are these good things?"

Meng Yixian replied with a smile: "Xu Beihong's picture of the Song and Crane Yannian, and a bronze cloisonné enamel Songhe Yannian tripod plate from the Jingtai period of the Ming Dynasty."

"What?! Works by Xu Beihong?"

Needless to say, Xu Beihong, who is known as the "Three Masters of Jinling" in the painting circle along with Zhang Shuqi and Liu Zigu, is well-known in our country.

There are only about 3000 pieces of Xu Beihong’s works in existence. The reason for the small number of extant works is that he himself was short-lived, and that he experienced mostly wars, so he didn’t have much time to paint with peace of mind.

There are more than 1200 pieces of Xu Beihong's works in the Xu Beihong Memorial Hall according to family heirlooms. Excluding some collections, there may be hundreds of original works circulated among the people.

Therefore, when everyone heard that it was Xu Beihong's work, they were somewhat surprised, and Qiao Qingtai couldn't wait to ask Meng Yi to take out the painting first.

This painting is not big, only more than two square feet, but it is Xu Beihong's work after all, if it is bigger, it is impossible to only have a value of two to three million yuan.

"Songhe Yannian" is a traditional birthday theme, and there are not many in Xu Beihong's works. The shape of the crane in this work is also derived from traditional paintings.

In the picture scroll, the crane stands on one leg on the branch of the pine tree, looks back sideways, and looks into the distance.

The crane outlines the shape with lines, and the feathers are drawn with ink. It is composed of black and white. Only the top of the crane is painted with cinnabar, and the eyes are painted with light yellow. Spirituality, all showing the strength of character of the crane.

The pine tree in the painting is smudged and rubbed with light ink, and the brush and ink are relatively rough, forming a contrast with the crane.In addition, the seal of this painting is "Donghai Wangsun", judging from the inscription, it should be a work given to a friend in 1941.

Although this painting is a birthday theme, it is not intense and enthusiastic. While explaining the basic structure, it is more suave and suave. Compared with many large paintings by Xu Beihong, this work has a more calm and free-spirited demeanor.Immediately, Zhu Dafu and Qiao Qingtai couldn't help but praise them loudly.

After a while, Zhu Dafu suddenly thought of a question, and asked with a strange expression: "Xiao Meng, I think this work is very good, but you said just now that this work cannot be sure that it is genuine. Is there something in it?" statement?"

"Indeed!" Meng Yi nodded first and said, "The family members of the friend in the inscription on this painting are my friends, but it's strange here. After I bought this painting, I went to my friend's house to ask, He said there was no such thing."

Things that had never been sent before came out. As long as you are not stupid, you must know that there is something wrong with this work.This made Zhu Dafu's Qiao Qingtai a little unbelievable for a while, because in their eyes, this painting was just like the real one, so why did it turn out to be a fake?

Zhu Dafu immediately asked: "Xiao Meng, could it be that the things were given away, but because something happened during the period, or because I concealed it, the family members didn't know."

"I've thought about this too." Meng Yixian said, "However, my friend said that this possibility is not uncommon, but it can be said to be very small. It is very unlikely that his elders will hide this kind of thing."

"Since there is still a glimmer of hope, then you didn't ask others to help identify it?" Qiao Qingtai asked.

Meng Yixian said: "No way, even though I collected this painting in the ghost market, the price was not high at that time, so I finally came across a work by Xu Beihong, how could I give up. But, I let me After seeing it, some of my friends said it was true, and some said it was not good. In the end, I was confused and didn’t know whether the painting was real or not.”

Hearing this, both Zhu Dafu and Qiao Qingtai were in a bit of a dilemma. They said it was fake, but they couldn't see what was wrong with it. They said it was true. Even the host had already said that, so they couldn't make something out of nothing, right?

Just as Zhu Dafu was frowning, he suddenly remembered that Chu Chen had been silent from just now until now. When he looked back, he found that Chu Chen was concentrating on the painting.

After a while, Chu Chen raised his head and found that everyone was staring at him. He couldn't help being a little surprised, and asked, "Why are you looking at me like that?"

Zhu Dafu said with a smile: "What else to do, of course I want to hear your opinion on this painting."

Chu Chen scratched his head and said, "How should I put it, I just think there is something strange. Look at the crane claws."

"Crane claw?"

Everyone looked over immediately after hearing the words. At first, everyone didn't find any problem, but after a while, Qiao Qingtai was extremely surprised and said, "Why do I think that this crane only has three toes on its right paw?"

Hearing what he said, Zhu Dafu and Meng Yixian also reacted. They took a closer look and found that it was true.

Because the style of this painting is more relaxed and easy, the raised left foot in the picture seems to be handled more casually, but no matter how casual, the number of toes must be expressed. It is impossible to say, four toes became three.

But when a forger paints, it is possible to make a mistake if the painting is not in place, but the biggest feature of Xu Beihong's works is the word "accurate", which also makes this problem the biggest flaw in the whole painting.

As for the reason why no one has discovered this problem before, it is also because the forger may deliberately deal with some speciousness. It seems to be right at first glance, and the other foot is correct, so it is easy to ignore it. mistake.

Seeing this situation, the three of them didn't know what to say anymore, Meng Yixian sighed and said: "Hey, what is fake is fake, no matter how hard it is, it can't be true!"

Zhu Dafu patted him on the shoulder and comforted him: "Xu Beihong has a lot of fake works, and there are quite a few fake ones that can be confused with the real ones. Even some experts have spotted them. Besides, your work is very high in imitation, and there are still some fake works. Collectible."

In today's calligraphy and painting market, Xu Beihong's works are very popular among collectors. Therefore, it is common to sell counterfeit works.Now the number of counterfeit works of Xu Beihong has exceeded the number of genuine works, and the methods of counterfeiting, such as cloning the original, redesigning, re-embracing, patchwork, etc., can be said to be varied.

In fact, after listening to his friend's answer back then, Meng Yixian also knew that the possibility of his items being fakes was very high. Therefore, although he is a little depressed now, he is not too sad. Besides, after so many years in the antique business, this matter It's really nothing to him.

Hearing what Zhu Dafu said, he nodded with a smile and said, "That's right. Anyway, I only bought this painting for 200 yuan. Considering the level of this painting, it must be worth it."

Zhu Dafu laughed when he heard the words, and then asked Chu Chen, "Xiao Chen, didn't you say that there are two problems? Where is the other one?"

Chu Chen pointed to the inscription and said, "Xu Beihong's calligraphy is generally swayed casually, with natural strokes and smooth lines, and his temperament is naturally revealed in it, but I feel that the inscription of this work is less free and easy, which is similar to the painting. Bi, it lacks such a taste, I think if it is an authentic work, it should not be like this..."

Ever since they knew that this work was a fake, when the three of them came to observe it again, they found that it was not the case. Although there were subjective factors in this, it was mainly due to the lack of skill of the forger.

"Forget it, let's take a look at this three-legged plate." After reading it, Meng Yi shook his head first, then put the painting away, and then put the copper body and cloisonné enamel three-legged plate in another brocade box. The tray was taken out.

When the things were taken out, Zhu Dafu didn't look at them first, but asked, "Xiao Meng, what's wrong with this three-legged plate?"

"I received this plate yesterday afternoon. I thought it was good at the time, and it cost me 2000 yuan. However, when I came back and looked at it again, I always felt that there was something wrong with it, but I didn't know the problem. Where did it come from. Originally, I planned to get someone to give me a hand today, but I didn't expect you to come, which just saved me trouble." At the end, Meng Yi laughed a few times.

Zhu Dafu said angrily: "I said, Xiao Meng, your courage to buy things is really getting bigger and bigger. I remember that you don't know much about cloisonne, and you will spend two thousand because it feels good. Buy it!"

"Isn't it because it's still cheap!" Meng Yixian said with a smile.

"Cheap?!" Zhu Dafu said with a half-smile, "Shouldn't it be enough to buy something cheap in our business? Meng Yixian, Meng Yixian! Do you feel too good about yourself, or are you getting back as you live? Even newcomers understand this The truth, you, the shopkeeper who has been playing for more than ten or twenty years, will you forget it too?"

Not only Zhu Dafu, but also Chu Chen and Qiao Qingtai felt that since Meng Yixian had been in the antique business for so many years, it was really inappropriate to have such a mentality.

As I said before, when buying antiques, you must not be greedy for cheap. If you buy antiques with the mentality of picking up leaks, there are countless examples of losing money in the antique industry.Of course, it was also possible that Meng Yi felt that things were cheap, even if they were fakes, it was fine.

However, counterfeit goods in the antique market are being "produced" all the time. If you buy one if you think it's cheap today, you'll buy one if you think it's cheap tomorrow. In the end, all I got was a bunch of fakes, and thanks from those who made and sold them.

This kind of behavior, to put it nicely, is called arrogance, and to put it bluntly, it means that people are stupid and have a lot of money.

Hearing Zhu Dafu's words, Meng Yi couldn't help but blush with shame. Speaking of which, he also understood the truth of what Zhu Dafu said. It's time to buy something just based on your own feelings.

Fortunately, his luck was pretty good, and he didn't suffer any big losses during the period, but if this continues, he will suffer big losses because of it sooner or later.

(End of this chapter)