@johnshoe Hmmm... Let's do it another way. Tell me what you liked about this vase?  My guess is that this is a shorter discussion than what is wrong with the vase.

@greeno107   I thought the drawing was done with care. I thought the figures seemed to be done in the same style as Kangxi pieces when I compared. Same types of faces and garb. I thought the colors could all be found in similar tones on true Kangxi examples. I found similar borders as what can be found on some Kangxi examples. I saw examples of Kangxi pieces that had very similar looking leaves and trees, etc. Clearly I am missing quite a lot, but other than the fact that someone is sweeping the floor and there is a crackle glaze ground nobody has said exactly what is so bad about this one and I would like to know. 

I just want to know why the woman is doing the work why the guy next to her with his broom is just standing around. Lol

@lotusblack  Which brings up an important question: does Giovanni still have to give me a million dollars if I find an example with a genuine Kangxi man sweeping the floor, or must it be a female? I will be looking for examples of both just in case.  

@johnshoe So, I can understand if you felt the design was Kangxi like....it is Kangxi like in that it has a palace like scene, and it is famille verte enamels, also associated with Kangxi. Again, from a technical standpoint, I think you did okay, except for the crackle brownish porcelain.  My first post was not too critical, was it?

However, the excitement of finding an old Chinese vase (and, yes, I think 120 years is pretty old) gets the adrenaline pumping.  Once the piece is in your hands (and nobody else can buy it from under your nose), THEN it is time to be self-critical.  What about the piece doesn't add up?

Aside from the crackle porcelain, you thought the rendering was done with care is where your experience hindered you.

There is a certain sophistication in genuine Kangxi works.  The scene in this vase is loose and whimsical... not what I would consider to be Kangxi taste.  

Take a look at the horses in this example.  

https://www.christies.com/lot/lot-a-rare-large-famille-verte-baluster-jar-6276550/?

So here is an example of something I think looks like total trash. The vase I posted seems miles above this. But for all I know someone will say this one right here is genuine Kangxi. In which case I might have to go bang my head against a stone wall for a minute.

Just FYI 19th century ginger jars are hot commodity in China right now.

@johnshoe  So, your small ginger jar is the very bottom of the spectrum of 19th-early 20th c. work copying the Kangxi style.  The lamp is maybe a 6 out of 10.

Here is a small vase I sold at the Miami Beach antique show about 5 years ago....I would argue a 10 out of 10 for 19th c. Kangxi copies.  I think I've seen some article on it floating around on Google.

Washing of the elephant is a famous motif from the late Ming into the Kangxi.

@greeno107  Interesting. I would have thought that jar of yours was a republic era piece. 

@greeno107 Do you continue to think the lamp is circa 1890's Kangxi revival? If so, I do not understand why people say 285 is too large a price. Is the fact that someone lamped it without drilling a good sign that someone valued the lamp? I see what you mean about the horses being less naive on your jar, but I continue to think the faces on the lamp were well drawn. I can understand the fact that Kangxi needs to have a bright white base and not brown looking crackle, but that elephant looks naively drawn to me. In any case, this is interesting. Sharon

Greeno is absolutely right. I repeated this many times already, the painting style comes FIRST!

It is the painting style that tells you, at first glance, and even at a distance: Kangxi/not Kangxi, Ming/not Ming, etc.

After that, closely inspecting, all the technical details are just confirming what you already knew.

I said it many times, and I also said that those shortcuts, the face, the brownish edge, etc etc, are, for the not experienced people, more dangerous than helpful. Yes, “because the blue is correct, then it is genuine”. Nope! ALL types of blues can be found during Kangxi. Even the blurred blue of the Japanese ware.

There is not a single detail that, taken alone, is a sure tool for dating a piece. Even more today.

Educate the eye on the style. An Italian painting of the 15th century is different from those of the 15^th century, which in turn is different from those of the 16^th century, and so on. It is not the type of colors that tells the expert the correct period. It could confirm, but nothing more.

BTW that vase is horrible. I will correct my previous comment: I would not pay ONE dollar. For what?

Giovanni

@clayandbrush  What about the style informs you that something is nice or not? Are you able to give any descriptive terms that can describe in more detail what you are talking about and what you look for? For example, if you were to finish the following sentence what would you say: "A good Kangxi famile verte baluster vase should be/have __________ "  

@sharonp So, I think the lamp vase (original post object) should be considered Kangxi revival because it's decoration is based upon Kangxi style, and was created during the period of the Kangxi revival period (late 19th c.).  Quality of rendering varied from low to high, some very loose interpretation of Kangxi style, while others were near exact matches.

The mouth of the lamp vase appears to have been cut off, so that reduces the value of this quality vase to just about zero.  I'm not sure how it is drilled from the photos, but if it is drilled it's worth half it's value....so half of zero....zero.

A lamp that runs the wiring outside the vessel can be an indication of quality, but not always.  There are a lot of 20th c. Guanyin blanc de chine figures worth about $20 that have the wire externally, so I don't recommend that you consider how it is lamped as a clue to the quality of the piece.

The elephant is deliberately drawn naively, so it does not follow the same rule as to how the horses were drawn.

In the Ming to Kangxi, there was nearly zero people in China that had first hand knowledge of what an elephant actually looked like.  So, during this period, renderings of elephants were made based upon word of mouth, so they were made with fanciful characteristics like veiny leaf ears, toes that stick out, sometimes extra tusks, really narrow trunks, and extreme wrinkles.

By the Qianlong period, knowledge of what elephants really looked like had become common knowledge, so elephants were rendered more anatomically correct.

In the case of my late 19th c. vase, the artist recreated the how he believed a Kangxi style elephant should look... not exactly correct to the Kangxi, but it is hard to unlearn what an elephant looks like.

As for the faces of the people.... we disagree...no problem.

@johnshoe Republic period pieces generally copied Qianlong style and marks.

@johnshoe

This discussion brings up a topic I have been thinking about over the past six months as I have looked at so many of these “Is this old,…good,…valuable…?” requests.  What keeps going through my mind is how does one develop “an eye” for quality when judging Asian antiques.  

This is going to sound simple minded, but here goes…STOP LOOKING AT BAD THINGS, START LOOKING AT GOOD THINGS! At the beginning, choose a class of items that bring you the most joy.  Ceramics, jades, bronzes, paintings, whatever they are seek out the best examples in museums, quality specific dealers, and specialized auctions. Unless you live in New York, London, or Hong Kong, expect this viewing/handling process to take years.  Arrange some of your vacation time to accommodate these activities.  Become known to curators in Asian departments at notable museums, contact professors at universities with Asian fine arts departments, and make friends with dealers in quality Asian antiques.

Until one develops an eye for quality, no notebook listing a bunch of rules to separate the good from the  bad will get you where you want to be.  I have the greatest admiration for those forum members who reliably respond to these unending requests for information regarding objects that in my eye are painful to view even as photographs.