how to approach authentication p.4
Considering the quality of composition it is good to involve time and topic of the painting. A good general explanation how to appraoch this is given in a video lecture of James Cahill. I will add an example how to seriously look at an compostion here in a side note.
Is a general quality according to our expectations, in the next step the individual brushwork should be compared to over works established as references. In the case this is not possible, because there are none – now this would be it.
The importance of general quality and individual brushwork should be differently valued in China and Japan.
Regarding Chinese paintings, we are mainly talking about works done by amateurs, members of the bureaucratic gentry, the landowning class. The dominance of this class of amateurs, the identical group is appearing as producers and collectors, allows professionally trained painters, with their superior technical skills to produce better paintings, forgeries to intrude the market. So unfortunately it is not a guarantee to accept the better drawn painting to easy.
So a coherent composition is a helpful addition to check on. Usually the hand, working with the original idea is doing the better job here. A very well painted forgery might slip in the understanding of an original composition.
The existence of ghost painters, forgers working only in the style of a requested artist is unfortunately complicating matters a little bit more. And also: who wants to be so careless to think that only original artworks are subject of imitations?
This gives in the case of Chinese painting and Japanese amateur painters (Zen-masters e.g. ) more value to the individual calligraphic style of the painter or calligrapher. Only of course, as long we could establish acceptable references to compare with.