Category: Conservation in the News

On March 29, 2015, as a side note to an article on the extent of the damage that ISIS militants inflicted on Palmyra, Syria, The New York Times published an article by Stephen Farrell (“If All Else Fails, 3D Models and Robots Might Rebuild Sites”) on the creation of precise three–dimensional digital models of Palmyrene monuments which could be used to reconstruct them if they were destroyed. In fact, right now in Carrara, Italy, robots are using digital information obtained from dozens of photographs to carve a scale replica of the 2nd century Roman triumphal arch that was destroyed in 2015. Roger L. Michel, Jr., founder and executive director of the Institute of Digital Archaeology is quoted as saying that, “If they knock it down, we will rebuild it. If they knock it down again, we will rebuild it again.” Tragically, as close as the replica might be to the original, it can never be the original.

In the March 22, 2016 issue of The Wall Street Journal (“A Down-and-Dirty Look at Degas”) , Susan Delson wrote about how MoMA Curator Jodi Hauptman and MoMA conservators Karl Buchberg and Laura Neufeld went to Jungle Press Editions to work with master printer Andrew Mockler on recreating the visual effects of Degas’ monotypes and came away from the session with increased knowledge and understanding. For all of the necessary emphasis on science as a means to understanding art, a session like theirs reminds us that there is equal value in recreating the artistic process.

In his article about the restoration of the main reading room and the Bill Blass Public Catalog Room of the New York Public Library’s  Schwarzman Building on Fifth Avenue at 42^nd Street (“Renovating A Great Hall And A Home For Scholars”, The New York Times, March 3, 2016), David W. Dunlap writes of the painstaking work and attention to safety that has made the project run more than two years past its estimated date of completion. On the subject of the time and money that went into this project, he quotes the library’s President Anthony W. Marx: “If we do the job right, hopefully it is once in a lifetime.”  This should be a motto for all of our work (barring inherent vice of materials and acts of God).

In his review of the exhibit “Munch and Expressionism” at the Neue Galerie in New York City ( “We All Scream”, The New Yorker, February 29, 2016), Peter Schjeldahl  notes that Edvard Munch “took to leaving his paintings outdoors through the brutal Norwegian winters—to ‘kill or cure’ them”.  One imagines that more paintings were killed than cured by this treatment and that the ones which survived have been suffering the effects of it ever since .

In his review, “Making and Looking”, published in the February 6-7, 2016 weekend edition of The Wall Street Journal, Charles Ray writes about Picasso’s 1934 “Woman with Leaves”, one of the many revelatory sculptures in the Museum of Modern Art’s “Picasso Sculpture” exhibit. I have read many reviews and articles about the recently closed exhibit, but this one stands out for its focus on the physical processes involved in making a work of art.  As Ray details them: “… making small impromptu molds from cardboard, filling them with wet plaster, stacking the resulting forms, and imprinting garden textures and shapes of leaves in the plaster…” Ray, a sculptor himself, knows that aesthetics and process are linked.

In the February 2, 2016 issue of The New York Times (“Upon Closer Review, Credit Goes to Bosch”), Nina Siegel writes about the exciting news that, after a careful study of its under layers by the Bosch Research and Conservation Project– using infrared photography and reflectography– a small 16^th century oil on panel “Temptation of St. Anthony” owned by the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, MO has been attributed to Hieronymous Bosch.  Julian Zugazagoitia, the museum’s Director and Chief Executive Officer, is quoted as saying, “It’s the same painting, and all of a sudden you see it with more affection.” Call me cynical, but could it be the extra value that is making the painting more lovable?

In the February 2, 2016 issue of The New York Times (“Temple of Dendur’s Lost Colors Brought to Life”), Joshua Barone describes how the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s MediaLab has created digital projections which restore the original painted colors  to one section of the Temple of Dendur. He notes that the MediaLab will be working on other projections. Remembering how it was long thought that Michelangelo was a draftsman rather than a colorist until the restoration of the Sistine Ceiling undermined that notion, one can only imagine the upheaval  in the shared perception of what the past looked like that such digital restorations will bring.

In the January 16-17, 2016 issue of The Wall Street Journal, Inti Landauro writes about the forthcoming restoration of the Louvre’s “St John the Baptist” by Leonardo da Vinci (“Another Leonardo to Come Clean”). In the article Landauro mentions that, while the “Mona Lisa” does not need treatment at this time, it is inevitable that it will undergo another restoration in the future. Think of all the lesser known works (or privately owned works) which have for the most part been left alone over the centuries and pity the famous masterpieces that have undergone very many restoration campaigns, some of them unnecessary or disastrous.

According to an article in the January 25, 2016 issue of The New York Times (“Egyptian Officials Face Tribunal for Damaging Mask”, by Declan Walsh), eight Egyptian museum officials have been suspended from their jobs and face permanent dismissal  as well as fines  after having been charged with negligence and violation of scientific and professional rules in connection with the 2011 repair of the burial mask of King Tutankhamen. That repair, made with epoxy, and attempts to remove the epoxy   left the artifact with permanent damage.  Eventually, the epoxy was removed and the mask repaired correctly  by German conservators.   One positive message we get from this sad occurrence is that conservation is now taken seriously in Egypt.   Another message—not at all positive—is that Egypt lacks trained conservators who are able to care for its cultural heritage.