Evaluating Your Collection (Winterthur Decorative Arts Series) - Softcover

Lanmon, Dwight

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0912724501 ISBN 13: 9780912724508

Publisher: Winterthur, 1999

Synopsis

What do Honus Wagner baseball cards, Queen Anne side chairs, and 19th-century ceramic lions have in common? At first glance, very little. Yet Evaluating Your Collection sets out to discuss this wide range of things that people collect, in order to guide them to a greater level of knowledge. Is an object really worth the price? How does one know what to look for? Can one recognize fakes and invisible repairs? What about color, finish, and form? In 1961, Charles F. Montgomery, Winterthur's first director, articulated a system for educating the eye and appraising the quality of an object. His fourteen points of connoisseurship, along with additions by Winterthur curators, conservators, and educators, form an unbeatable system. Understanding them, and how they interrelate, equips readers with a basic expertise necessary to operate in the world of antiques. Compact, reader-friendly, and illustrated in full color with objects largely from Winterthur's outstanding collection, this and future series volumes provide invaluable advice. Armed with tips from the experts, your trips to estate auctions, flea markets, or your grandmother's attic will never be the same.

About this title

Product Description:

Evaluating Your Collection A book on connoisseurship launches the new Winterthur Decorative Arts Series. Utilizing the unparalleled resources of the Winterthur collection and staff, these books will provide a unique forum of "how-to" advice for novices and experts alike. Full description

Review:

"A calmly reasoned, quietly persuasive document that can make the mysteries of taste comprehensible to almost anyone . . . The 14 criteria are flexible enough to be applied to nearly every object - from a Honus Wagner baseball card to a Queen Anne chair. They touch on such elements as form, color, and finish and help neophytes discern fraudulent pieces as well as concealed repairs."-- "Preservation Magazine"

About this edition

• Publisher: Winterthur
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0912724501
• ISBN 13: 9780912724508
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 123