Topic: What is this?

[Frank]

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=320126567316

[TxSilver]

It is a vase that is made in Poland. The ones that I have seen have been signed Fulvio Bianconi, but it is a forgery. There is, unfortunately, a good number of these forged vases out there. A couple have been sold on eBay. I guess someone needs to add a warning blog about these on eBay. The Bianconi heirs write that it is definitely a forgery.

Anita

[Frank]

Very pricey Polish vase, if the engraver learns to do straighter lines these could go through the roof.

Are the other signed pieces by the seller good?

I am sure that the Polish one was used by Chrism but the signature looks a bit different to his.

[josordoni]

I wonder if that is a useful section that could be added here, like the Murano labels, on known forgeries?

similarly the Dodgy Bricklayers being reported nearly every day on the Whitefriars.org forum. Could be a useful thumbs up to new collectors coming here to have all the warnings in the same place?

[Frank]

People that pay $1,000 plus tend not to go search for attribution confirmations on the web!

Plus it would be a full time job just with current eBay auctions :-)

[TxSilver]

It could be that the seller does not know that the signature is a forgery. The first time that I saw the vase was on another Murano board. It had been brought to an auction house to be sold. Fortunately, the auctioneer was a good one who verified the identity of things before putting them on the block. She wrote the Bianconi's, who told her that it was a forgery. I ran into another a couple of weeks ago on eBay and sent the link to the family. They wrote me back to say that they were not sure if the fake signature had been added when it was made or after. So many of the vases are out there that I suspect the signature was added close to the source.

The heirs are pretty firm about the fraudulent use of Fulvio Bianconi's name to sell glass (www.fulviobianconi.com). The last one that I saw for sale on eBay went for a bit over $100 US. The winner was probably ecstatic to get a Bianconi for the small amount. I don't know how much the Polish vase would sell for -- probably not at all on eBay.

There are so many Murano fakes out there, it is hard to know how to warn people. There are a couple of excellent articles that people can pull up on eBay (the ones to the left of the search page). I wish we could get all of the oriental and south American pieces out of the Italian category. But I know that is not going to happen.

Anita

[TxSilver]

BTW, I have to add that I doubt Bianconi ever made anything that looked like the gray vase. His work is much more colorful and playful. If he had done the gray vase, I would assume that he must have been having a very bad day.

Anita

[Frank]

I am sure 

Who is making lookalikes in South America?

[Frank]

The Bianconis's had gone a bit over the top using Vero and threats to stop auctions using the Bianconi name - they did this regardless of the veracity of the attribution. So legitimate dealers found themselves unable to sell anything designed by Bianconi if they mentioned the fact - not because there was merit in the claims but because eBay is run by idiots as far as this type of thing is concerned.

I assume that they have stopped that now though

[Frank]

eBay do not let you contact eBayers that you are not doing business with any more - must have had complaints from the scam artists.

If anyone knows the buyer, mention this thread to them.