What Is Considered Genuine Antique Painting

Buyer Beware. This is absolutely vital in the world of antiques and collectibles. In the world of antique paintings there are plenty of places that advertise antique paintings for sale. However are they genuine? Often on close examination it is obvious that they are only copies and lack the quality found only in a genuine vintage painting.

Artists have been creating reproductions of originals for hundreds of years. Some artist have dedicated their lives to reproducing antique oil paintings by old masters and have become extremely good at it. Often their work is made for decorators, connoisseurs and collectors and even some of the best experts would have a hard time distinguishing them from period works of art.

So let's step back a bit and try and figure out what is considered to be a genuine antique painting. Even this is not easy as there are three differing opinions here as well. As you can imagine with three opinions there is bound to be some confusion making it difficult for anyone to be sure whether their painting is really an antique or not. It seems to all depend on who is viewing the painting. But for all intents and purposes here we are going to take the opinion that any painting over 100 years old is classified as an antique painting.

Despite the differing opinion as to what qualifies a painting as a genuine antique, there continues to be many collectors willing to pay a lot of money for what they perceive to be one that is genuine. While others collectors have turned their attention to "antique paintings" done by artists who are lesser known. Still other collectors have broadened their collection with other types of paintings than just antique oil paintings.
Other types of antique pictures are watercolors, and sketches. Even prints of original paintings are collected by certain collectors and can sell extremely well and for high prices to those looking to collect paintings by certain artists.

Today, there is a new type of collector that only collects prints of famous or antique paintings. Some will spend years looking for a painting they want to make their collection complete. It seems no matter what there are collectors ready to spend whatever in order to add a painting they want to their personal collection.

Another type of painting that has become a collectors choice are artists mock ups. The medium of choice for most artists for their major works has long been oil. Mock ups on the other hand are those smaller panels artist's often create in the field and then they paint their major works on larger canvases when they return to their studio. These smaller painting can be oils, watercolors or even sketches. They are originals but were never intended to be finished works of art by the artist. But these small panels often had a lot to them as they captured the subject live. They were there and often captured the mood or energy of the happening and therefore have maybe even more energy in them then the major paintings did.

One thing that is absolutely true is that the collector who hasn't made a mistake and bought a phony painting as genuine doesn't exist.

But this one thing is for sure. Antique paintings are not only wonderful to look at, they are also a real thrill to own and if they are chosen carefully can be a very sound investment.

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