Misbehaved Dealers

A very good Sunday afternoon to know more about antiques and a dealer, the three of us with the two of them had known each other before me. One of them an antique collector cum dealer, he told the both of us that a group of Chinese came to buy some items from him but did not mentioned the when and the number of them. Recently one of these men came back wanted to buy some more and this collector cum dealer refused to sell any items to him (one dealer) for the reason that the earlier deal had made the buyers rich and also asked for discount by them until this local dealer got fed up.

My protest against his action was that when the Chinese dealers bought the antiques from him, they have to put up capital and risk. I told this local dealer that you were hoping that Chinese buyers with the items bought from you to take back to China and not able to sell and go bankrupt. This dealer who came back is a successful dealer whereas the rest of them has not been so successful and this successful dealer has found that the antiques with this local dealer as important and the only thing is to increase the price and make better profits and do not sell if the price is not to your satisfaction instead of rejecting him. This local dealer has regretted selling his antiques at a low price at the previous deal and jealous of this successful dealer making profits from his pieces.

Later this local dealer asked me to get some buyers for him whom I have to turn him away for not sensible way in dealing and his arrogance. There are a lot of people that I have to distant myself where there is a waste of time. Many collectors, dealers and experts are jealous of my father running his antique business then and now the burden is with collectors with the ability to prove genuineness for their private owned artefacts.

I remembered reading an article in the local newspaper featuring a famous Chinese antique furniture collector holding a rare piece of antique bench in his hand in a photograph. The bench is a rare piece of furniture but meant for Chinese ancestor.

 Most of the collectors by now must have known what are genuine antiques and not on guessing basis after I had mentioned so many famous experts for consulting or sharing.   

Many Wicked Collectors Came By

On the1st, April this year a friend who works for a Chinese Newspaper company and a collector in Chinese antique porcelain items brought two items, one is a Ming dynasty Blue and white cover jar and the other is a Ching dynasty polychrome enamel jar. At the time he contacted me, I was at my niece’s coffee shop having my lunch. I then told him to come over to the coffee shop and at the coffee shop, my niece, mee stall operators and customers pick up some knowledge about antiques and a day of fun for my friend and others. Before my friend left the place, he told me that nobody has told him what I had told him about the characteristics from the old pieces.

Collectors with knowledge will only have fun in collecting Chinese Antiques. Dealers will want to profit from sales but for me I had already in my blog that “Do not become a collector if you have not started to be one” and to be a good collector must be able to let any man understand how to tell the items are old or new. Collectors will only want to insist that the items that they have collected are genuine and loudly claimed that they are “antiques” but I claim that all antiques need to be proven to be genuine in order to be “precious” or of high value.

Malaysia has been a difficult place to carry out antique business so it would be better carry out this business in another country. No local collectors want to see my things and when I have no business, I have to look for a good way to make my livelihood. I recall a call off deal and this incident involves three parties one is my father, the second is a couple who has been a long time customer and the third is a busy body who like to check at this couple buying. This couple was not happy with this man’s action and to protect customer’s relationship we had to do was that based on trust to send a Ching dynasty Yung Cheng period (A.D. 1723- A.D. 1735) Clair-de-lune big mei ping jar with embossed flower to this couple’s house before this man sees the item and later the husband of this couple came with a friend took another same jar with other flower. These two mei ping jar was left with the couple for a while and the wife told me to take back two jars, the husband asked me why am I in a hurry to take back the two jars and my reply is that your wife told me to take back the jars (husband wants the two jars and the wife do not want the jars) and that when I am free things need to be done I will do. The wife called up to negotiate the price for the jars which is priced at Rm16,000 she got angry and throw force at my father to take back the two jars and saying that the two are only few thousand ringgit worth. I remembered very well that this happened that while I was busy accompanied my mother doing some shopping and when my father told her that Ronnie will only be available in about an hour time and she replied saying that the two jars are taking up the spaces where painting job and my father was forced or compelled to send my younger brother to take back the two jars. Later I found out that experts told this couple that many things that are for sale at my father’s place were fakes. After my father’s passed on this couple discovered the truth and contacted me to buy Chinese antiques but prices have changed which made them difficult to buy.

The two jars which are not for sale and with other things beautify my house very much and also it teaches me not to share knowledge with others. Recently I came to know an uncommon musical instrument tuner in Malaysia who died without teaching anyone how to tune and this person has also taught me “not to teach others children to be clever” is a Chinese proverb. All along there are no good collectors in Chinese antique porcelain and many are bogus experts and collectors. The largest part of fun is to know and see collectors and experts embarrass themselves. 

Private Antique Collectors in Singapore

There is a visitor from Singapore searching for “private chinese antics collectors in Singapore” and my only answer is that I have not heard of any. South East Asian Ceramic Society was founded by some people in Singapore and Malaysia then.  However I would treat case to case by trying to search for collectors in this not only in Singapore, Malaysia but elsewhere like Hong Kong and China. The saying goes “among the blind, the one with the one eye is the king” with so far no good knowledgeable collector has been found. Another two visitors from Kuala Lumpur with one searching for “nyonya ware prices” and the other searching for “antique Malaysia”. Nyonya ware prices depends on Bandung nyonya ware or Jing dezhen nyonya ware and also the items like saucer, spoons to tell the price and not just guessing. It is easy to give a price without looking at the items anything below Rm5/-. Antique Malaysia may have been there for a long time but no longer existing, failure due to collectors’ attitude. Many claimed to be mighty but doesn’t know how to authenticate their own items and wanted to claim that dealer is selling Bandung copies or fakes which is commonly spread around.

Many collectors have claimed to be good and when question on the judgement in authenticity most of them fail. I do not want to share this kind of action and I have mentioned in my earlier blog about knowledgeable collectors which means any persons who can give good answer or answers to the judgement in genuine or fake artefacts.

Being a dealer is a problem because if you tell customers that this is of this age and straight away got a shout at as bullshit which makes dealers do not know what collectors wanted. The sale condition “Take Notice Goods Sold are not returnable but returnable on the condition that the Goods Mentioned above are proved that they are modern copies. The proofs must be sufficient and must have written remarks from experts.” is to protect the buyers/collectors and dealers from being cheated and also to help collectors to be more knowledgeable in authentication by writing down the characteristics on the artefacts or keeping journals for their items but was totally ignored. Collectors prefer to buy with “rumour buy, rumour sell. The balls are all in the collectors’ court. Antique dealers find this business difficult because profits to cover overheads made it very difficult to sustain. At present collectors from the People’s Republic of China has been searching for reliable dealers and many has been visiting Malaysia with the view to buy good Chinese antique porcelain which was sold out once upon a time to be taken back to China.

 Many years ago I tried to get rid of the genuine and fake problems but was looked down by local collectors and experts. With the long existing problems bringing me down I would not want to burden myself with wanted things anymore. At the food court in Taman Desa, I met a man call Johnny who also sells antiques and I invited him to join me for tea and I told him how to authenticate porcelain and why are old porcelain items worth collecting, he was so happy that in return let me know that somebody told him that I am a proud and arrogant chap, I then told him that why are we talking for hours if I have been arrogant type, he smiled and after all the truth has prevail and I am not interested who that liar is after all I have met up with many liars including collectors and experts who are liars in authenticating Chinese Antique Porcelain. Experts who cannot tell genuineness can only say “imitations can be made exactly the same as originals” which means they are condemning the items in the museum. The word “Ming” character in Chinese was said to be wrongly written in http://www.taimantis.com/chinese/fakes.html#UPD and the wrongly written Chinese character was found in one Ming dynasty piece belonged to Mrs. Alfred Clark and also a piece in a museum in Paris which I do not know whether is the same piece that is ex- Mrs. Alfred Clark. I am yet to find out whether the piece is genuine or fakes because I have my ways to find out instead to jump in wrong conclusion. Artists can paint beautiful motives but may not be good at writing beautiful Chinese characters. This was shown in a book that finely written Chinese characters in reign marks was also copied later or by Japanese potters.