The moment comes just at the end. There's a breathless pause and then -- perhaps -- the appraiser smiles. "I would say this Tiffany lamp is worth $30,000 to $40,000." And the owner looks stunned, shocked and pleased all at once. Moments like these are what viewers of the wildly popular "Antiques Roadshow" on PBS live for: The instant when a treasured object is validated, or a former piece of junk is elevated to prize status. It's trash to treasure, the Impressionist in the attic.

In the wider world, how often does this kind of financial lightning strike?

"Almost never," says Bill Johnston, associate director of the Walters Art Gallery in Baltimore.

But the high profile of the television show (10 million people watch it every week) coupled with a strong economy is raising interest in antiques and art objects -- and in the appraisal of them.

On the show, it looks a little like magic, as they pull the numbers out of a hat. But what, exactly, is involved in the art and science of attaching dollar signs to art objects? We decided to find out, using a pair of vases I bought in Switzerland in 1982 for about $300.

The vases are about 18 inches tall, urn-shaped, with handles and a glaze of terra cotta, mustard and umber.

I visited dealers in Baltimore and Savage, two museum curators, a professional appraiser and finally sent pictures of them to Sotheby's in New York.

The results were mixed.

Jimmy Judd, of Amos Judd & Sons Antiques on Howard Street, pronounced the objects "gorgeous. Deco, about 1920. I think it's French." His estimate of value: $1,000 for the pair.

But Judd noted that his is only an educated guess. To find a true value, the vases would have to be researched, similar objects found and recent values identified. "If we can't figure it out," he said, "we would send it to the Baltimore Museum of Art, or the Walters. They have the resources to look it up."

He pointed out, however, that public institutions, like art galleries, are not allowed to suggest values, only identify origins, of objects.

Judd will almost always offer an opinion about what an item is worth. However, the first thing he considers is whether or not he has the expertise to identify an item. He specializes in paintings, bronzes and European furniture.

A few doors down, at the Antique Treasury, Thelma Hilger believed she recognized the shape and style of my vases. "Austrian amphorae," she said. "I've seen things like them from Teplitz, a city in Austria." She estimated their time frame as anywhere from the turn of the century to 1930. Value: $600 to $800 for the pair.

She said, "You have to be careful when you're appraising an item -- especially if the person is going to base a decision to buy or sell on your opinion."

At Dubey's Art & Antiques Inc. also on Howard Street, Phil Dubey dug into antiques encyclopedias and price books, looking for the almost unreadable mark on the bottom, which he thought might be something like "Don Lac."

The art of appraising antiques, he said, is a combination of research, experience and gut feeling. To illustrate, he got out a little statue of a grinning Chinese man who is wearing a Mandarin hat and appears to be eating something in his hand.

"He's a great character," said Dubey, who specializes in Chinese export porcelain. "He's got a lot of humor."

In evaluating the piece, he said, "the first thing you look at is the style. Is the style good? Then you go to the next level. Is the painting correct, is the porcelain correct?"

That's the experience part. Next, the research. Dubey found a nearly identical figure in a catalog from Christie's, the New York auction house, in 1991. That one, from the Kangxi period (1665-1722), was sold for $5,000.

And then the gut feeling. He had some questions about his piece. The bottom had two sets of marks, and a small hole. "There were no marks on Chinese export porcelain," he said.

Further research proved the piece to be made in France in the 1940s by Samson and Co., a firm so skilled at reproducing old porcelain that it is known in the trade as "Samson the Impostor." Dubey's figurine was worth about $900.

As for my vases, he pronounced them ironstone, "definitely European" and possibly French, and thought they might date to the 1920s. However, he could not find any reference to the mark on the bottom, and declined to place a value on them.

From Howard Street, the vases and I next went to Howard County, where Jeff Gunther, who has three shops in the Savage Mill complex, pronounced them Art Nouveau, probably French, dating to 1880 to 1910.

Gunther, who's been in the antiques business nearly 50 years, thinks growing enthusiasm for the "Antiques Roadshow" is a good thing. Everybody should look through their attic and basement for potential treasure, he said. "That's healthy. Let them look and find. I'm in favor of education of any kind."

They might, for instance, find something like the three-tier candlesticks, black with tarnish, Gunther acquired in a trade. When they were cleaned up, they turned out to be sterling, hallmarked by a New York silversmith in 1750. They sold at auction for $50,000.

He thought my vases might be worth $350 each.

At this point, I had learned a lot about antique silver, Chinese export porcelain, American furniture and other fascinating bits of history. But the mystery of my vases had only deepened.

I thought the signature would help identify them, but, at the Walters Art Gallery, curators Bill Johnston and Cheryl Snay said there are hundreds of marks recorded, and who knows how many never documented. "The marks and the size are not always a clue," Johnston said.

He often tries to help people identify their objects, he said, but "the most common error I encounter is that people have reproductions. Breaking the news to them is the hard part."

He encourages people who want to inquire about an object to send a letter with a good picture of the item. "If it's something that looks good, I might want to refer them to an expert in the field," he said.

He thought my vases were "definitely transitional" between the sinuous nature-themed lines of Art Nouveau and the more stylized Art Deco, and possibly were made around 1910. Art Nouveau was fashionable in France at the end of the 19th century, he said. Before that, French ceramics were dominated by porcelain. But in the 1870s, there was an influx of Japanese influence, and pottery became popular. At the same time, educational reform had encouraged industrial arts. Nouveau artisans often applied hand-crafted finishes to mass-produced objects -- like my vases.

James Abbott, curator of decorative arts at the Baltimore Museum of Art, confirmed that the vases are European art pottery, designed for a mass market, and probably made around 1910. "They have a beautiful glaze," he said, "probably inspired by Chinese firing techniques." Their style, he said, indicates they are French, at least in inspiration.

Appraiser Tim Naylor also declined to put a value on the vases since this wasn't his field of expertise. But, he said, "The fact that there's a pair of them says a lot. Antiques are the only thing in the world that the more you have of a thing, the more each one is worth."

Finally the vases made an appearance at a seminar on porcelain and ceramics with Sotheby's senior expert Letitia Roberts at Hampton National Historic Site in Towson. Roberts was evaluating objects brought in by audience members. Since the vases were outside her area of expertise, we sent pictures to experts in Arts and Crafts at Sotheby's in New York.

They identified the mark on my vases as Denbac, probably the name of the pottery, likely dating from the 1930s, with an auction value of under $1,000. They weren't sure where they were made.

And that, for me, has to be the last word. The vases are worth more than I paid for them, but that's not surprising.

Abbott wondered how important values are to most people. The late actor Vincent Price, he said, was an avid collector who wrote a book called "I Know What I Like" -- a philosophy he encourages in all collectors.

"I'm not sure it matters if you pick something up for $35 and it turns out to be worth $3,500," he said. "You bought it because you like it, and that should be its value."

THE APPRAISALS

The pair of vases (left) was bought in 1982 for about $300.

Experts now offer these appraisals:

Jimmy Judd, of Amos Judd & Sons Antiques: $1,000

Thelma Hilger, of Antique Treasury: $600 to $800

Jeff Gunther, who has three shops in the Savage Mill complex: $700

Arts and Crafts experts at Sotheby's: Less than $1,000

Pub Date: 03/07/99