18th-Century Flambé Meiping Vase
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GUEST:
This was my grandfather's. It was given to him during my father's birth in 1925. I appropriated it from my father about 1968, and it's been in my home ever since.
APPRAISER:
The material is porcelain, as opposed to pottery or clay. And we can tell that-- and I'll put my glasses on, because I can't see. When you flip it over, the sort of white color that you get here, that is the porcelain clay, the actual color. Now, the mark that's there tells us when it was made and where it was made. More importantly for the moment is the glaze itself. This is a very specific type of glaze made in Asia, and it's called flambé, which is a French word, and it just refers to this sort of mixture of beautiful turquoises, the sky blue, with this deep, rich red, sort of ox blood kind of a color. And you'll also notice, on the surface, there's lots of little pits.
GUEST:
Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER:
That's characteristic of this particular type of glaze. Now, this glaze is imitating a specific type of material first appearing in the 12th- 13th century in China, during the Song Dynasty. It was copied at a later date. Now, the later date this was copied was during the 18th century. And that mark I showed you on the bottom...
GUEST:
Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER:
...actually indicates that this was made between 1736 and 1795.
GUEST:
Oh, my God.
APPRAISER:
It also says that it was made for the imperial household of China.
GUEST:
Oh, my God.
APPRAISER:
Those are all wonderful things. The pitting, the color, the sort of green tinge around the top, the shape is called a meiping-- all those things verify that this is authentic.
GUEST:
Wow.
APPRAISER:
It's real.
GUEST:
It's beautiful.
APPRAISER:
It's a very special object. It has one problem. And I'm gonna spin it around, and you've mentioned it to me. It's got a little bit of a line down through the glaze. That's called a glaze crack.
GUEST:
Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER:
And it probably came because somebody whacked the side of it with another hard object. So would you like to know the sales value or sort of the insurance value, or does it matter?
GUEST:
The insurance value, because I have a feeling I'm probably gonna have to do that.
APPRAISER:
You have a treasure from the Qing Dynasty, the Qianlong period. I would insure this for... $40,000.
GUEST:
(breathlessly): Oh, my God.
APPRAISER:
If it didn't have that line, I would insure it for $75,000.
GUEST:
Wow.
Appraisal Details
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