Here was a distinctly man-made disaster of epic proportions. Director and Conservator, Special Projects, Barbara Heller’s past experience had included work on 1966 Florence flood-damaged books and paintings and she was a responder for the DIA’s emergency team, yet no amount of disaster mitigation had prepared her for the stress and uncertainty of bankruptcy. At the risk of oversimplification, the Detroit Institute of Fine Arts’ collection was put at risk of being sold when the city of Detroit declared Chapter 9 in July, 2013.
The DIA collection, one of the largest in the country, includes iconic works by Bellini, Breugel, Frans Hals and Diego Rivera to name a few. Incorporated as a private nonprofit “Founders Society” in 1885, the DIA had moved from the private sector to a city-owned entity in 1919, with a new building dedicated to the people of Detroit. Now the City’s creditors believed the artwork should be sold against municipal debts. The DIA maintained that it held the collection in trust for the public and that it was not for sale.
Christie’s was contracted to appraise the entire collection over a period of four months. Museum staff had to oversee the evaluators while they examined the collection in three phases. Collections management set up a designated examination room in an effort to limit access to museum storage.
Barbara was asked to conduct research, both for the evaluators and the DIA’s lawyers. Her talk emphasized the importance of maintaining access to original collection files, including registration, donor/dealer, curatorial and conservation reports. Barbara’s search revealed critical discrepancies between the museum’s digital database and the original files. For example, several early acquisitions including a Van Gogh and Matisse were listed as city donations in the digital database. Original minutes from early meetings revealed the works had been purchased by private donors and transferred to the City.
A “Grand Bargain” was eventually struck which became the City’s plan to exit bankruptcy, fund pensions and prevent the sale of DIA’s artwork. The Court found that selling the DIA’s collection would be to “forfeit Detroit’s identity.” Not quite out of the woods yet, the DIA had to raise 100 million dollars as part of the deal. Happily, a key piece of the fundraising was a 26 million dollar gift from the Ford Foundation. As of 2015, the DIA once again became a nonprofit corporation aka Founders Society Detroit Institute of Arts. As etched on the marble facade in the late 1920’s, the collection remains “Dedicated by the People of Detroit to the Knowledge and Enjoyment of Art.”
Category: Topics
44th Annual Meeting- Joint Photographic Materials + Research and Technical Studies Session- Surface Roughness, Appearance and Identification of AGFA-Gevaert Photograph Samples- by Dr. W. Wei and Sanneke Stigter
Having encountered some very bizarre textures in matte Gevaluxe prints during a National Portrait Gallery internship several years ago, I was eager to learn more about the characterization of these interesting papers. The popular Gevaluxe papers (made by Belgian company Gevaert) often had a velvety matte appearance that was desired by many mid-twentieth century photographers.
This project was inspired by a concern that the increasing reliance of museums on digital surrogates for original photographs might not capture all of the original properties of the photograph. Even where a traditional silver-gelatin or chromogenic photograph has been used as a surrogate, the textured surface of the replacement paper might not match the original. The work Hoe Hoeker Hoe Platter by Dutch artist Ger Van Elk was used as an example of a mixed media photographic work where texture played an important role in conservation decisions. Texture can influence the perception of color, so it was important to characterize the essential properties of the paper’s texture.
Paul Messier’s research was considered an important first step, but Bill Wei’s research team in the Netherlands sought to leverage some of the technology from other industries where surface texture and roughness are systematically quantified (such as the auto industry). First, Wei gave an overview of some of the techniques employed in texture measurement: polynomial texture mapping and confocal white light profilometry. In this project, confocal white light profilometry was used to create a non-contact contour map with a resolution of 60 nanometers. Gloss measurements were also used; on a matte surface the difference between incident and reflected light is the light scattered, so the glossiness (or lack thereof) can be quantified.
The study compared human perception with quantitative texture measurements in observations of textured paper and their apparent roughness or smoothness. An Agfa-Gevaert sample book from the 1970’s served as the source material. Only three of the samples were color papers, so they were more difficult to evaluate. The 25 samples were categorized into 5 groups. Some of the groups had a “macro” texture of waviness, versus a “micro” texture of roughness on a much smaller scale. Group 1 was smooth. Group 2 papers had a very fine texture. Papers assigned to Group 3 displayed the fine texturing in the Group 2 papers, combined with a large-scale waviness. Group 4 exhibited the waviness of Group 3, without the fine texture. Group 5, which included some of the color papers, was comprised of a very regular pattern of raised circular nubs or dots. For anyone who has a lot of family photos from the 1970’s, that dot texture will seem quite familiar.
The research is ongoing, so the presenter mentioned some preliminary observations, without drawing any conclusions. There was not a direct relationship between roughness and gloss. For example, samples from Groups 4 and 5 were just behind group 1 in gloss. The human observers demonstrated that their perceptions of smoothness did not always correlate with the quantitative measurements, especially for some papers in Group 2. It will be interesting to hear the follow-up results as the research team continues the project.
44th Annual Meeting – Emergency Session, May 16, “Lighting a Fire: Initiating an Emergency Management Program,” by Rebecca Fifield
Instituting an emergency management program at your organization is hard. I don’t think anyone would ever argue that. And it’s not just about a written emergency plan. While this is a great place to start, and certainly integral to a complete program, it doesn’t inspire and excite. It doesn’t create an emergency preparedness culture. Rebecca Fifield, a Preservation Consultant and owner of Rebecca Fifield Preservation Services, spoke about several ways to ignite a planning effort and maintain momentum when starting an emergency management program at your institution.
First, create a vision. Don’t just update your phone tree. Get a budget line, meet with your local community, and set up training exercises. Asking for a premium plan built on best practices creates the greatest impact and helps staff get behind the change.
Next, refine and strengthen that vision by creating relationships with allies. Allies can make your project stronger by challenging assumptions, informing the project with their industry expertise, and using their connections to develop momentum around your idea. But how do we identify these allies? Are they our supervisors? Yes! If they haven’t considered it before now, educate your supervisor about how risk management and emergency preparedness go hand-in-hand and how they both are part of our professional responsibility. (See Marie Malaro’s A Legal Primer for Managing Museum Collections). Are our allies Conservators, Registrars, Collections Managers, Security, Facilities Managers, Curators, Educators, IT staff, Human Resources, Communications, and Development? YES TO ALL! Emergency preparedness efforts can often be attached to efforts such as the institutional audit process, health and safety initiatives, construction, or large-scale conservation projects. Start a talking campaign. Remember that a disaster effects every staff member, so it only makes sense to have them as part of your web of allies.
Set a time-sensitive goal. Put a time frame on preparedness to create a challenge, because it can be easy to keep putting off planning. Pose questions that reveal preparedness needs for specific institutional goals: Could there be a potential protest related to an upcoming exhibition? Will you be effected by the upcoming hurricane season? Are you in a region that often deals with large amounts of snow? Look at your historical record. Has your organization suffered a past emergency, and what was the impact on people and collections? Are you dealing with aging infrastructure? Survey your staff. Does everyone know their role in an emergency? These aren’t meant to be scare tactics. This is to make sure that the decision-makers at your institution are well-informed.
Connect with other institutions and your community. Reach out to similar organizations to your own and find out who’s on their planning team and their responsibilities. Take this time to establish an informational exchange. Meet other emergency managers in your region. Get involved with professional organizations such as Alliance for Response, as well as regional responders like the Virginia Association of Museum’s Emergency Response Teams and your local Community Emergency Response Team (CERT). Encourage involvement from staff by having some of these organizations come to you for a talk or training exercises.
Be resilient in the face of negativity. We are all very busy and you may receive some push-back from management and staff. Use emergency management as an opportunity for situational leadership, which allows you to display your ability to lead for the future. It hones your persuasion skills, creates ties with operations and administration colleagues, and provides you with a ready opportunity for development that your current position may not provide. It may take months, and even years, to understand how your institution will function in an emergency, the decisions that will need to be made, and the conversations to confirm direction and readiness. Just remember, that time is as important as developing the plan itself.
44th Annual AIC Meeting, Pre-Conference Session, May 14: "Florence: Days of Destruction" by Franco Zeffirelli
If we try to pinpoint which events have caused major changes in our lives, we might come to the conclusion that many of them unfolded unexpectedly. And the worst ones seem to also happen fast. Whether we realize it or not, the Florence floods of 1966 were such a change. Many might not remember this time at all, and others – myself included – were yet to be born. As any other part of world history, it is a story that needs to be retold.
One of the pre-conference events was the screening of Franco Zeffirelli’s “Florence: Days of Destruction”. The Florentine filmmaker probably found that filming in this time of need was a way to cope with the immense gravity of the situation. What he also did was create a platform for awareness. The original Italian title, “Per Firenze”, reflects Zeffirelli’s attachment to his hometown and to all that it represented. Richard Burton, who narrates the film, could sympathize as he had recently seen his beloved Wales go through something similar. It doesn’t take being in the film business to relate to this feeling.
On Saturday, February 20th, 2010, heavy showers followed by landslides transformed Madeira Island – the place I will probably always call home – into a sort of gigantic mudbath. Everything that could be dragged from the mountain tops to the shore was. People were hurt, some even died that day. In a video published on February 21st by SkyNews, one sees how mother nature was nothing short of relentless:
On the quiet days that followed, there was a collective sense of mourning and loss. Everyone was shocked. I felt numb. Although I usually had no problem taking photographs, somehow I could not make myself pick up my camera. I could never be a photojournalist.
I first returned to work on February 23rd. Walking through the downtown part of Funchal, I saw damage on a scale I never thought I would have seen before. In a way, it felt like it could have been a war zone. Coincidence or not, that’s said in Zeffirelli’s film about Florence.
After about a week, the conservation team at the Arquivo Regional da Madeira, where I was working at the time, was contacted to provide help to a few cultural institutions in need. The buildings where they had their storages were on downtown Funchal, where basements had simply become pools of rubble. After draining the water out, they needed help figuring out how to deal with piles of books and documentation.
This experience changed my attitude towards conservation, setting a whole new standard of what an object in bad condition looked like. As much as those were tough times, they also provided bonding time with my colleagues. We kept each others spirits up amidst less than pleasing working environments when by the end of the day we were proud of our muddy coveralls. I would like to think it was a feeling common to all of those who put themselves to work during that time.
However catastrophic the situation that Zeffirelli’s documentary shows, it also focuses on the positive outcome that even such an event might have. It underlined the importance of cultural heritage in society and how it could bring people together because it was the right thing to do.
Because Zeffirelli’s work transcended into one of those things that are greater than the object itself, the film was shown for the first time after being digitally restored at this year’s AIC-CAC conference. It brought us together again at the conference, even after all these years have gone by. Not all the destruction was in vain after all.
To see how this event was portrayed in the media of its day, I encourage you to also take a look at the LIFE magazine Dec. 16th, 1966 issue (the report on the flood starts on page 28).
Joint 44th AIC Annual Meeting & 42nd CAC-ACCR Annual Conference, General Session, May 16, “Clandon Park – rising from the ashes,” by Christine Leback Sitwell
In the spring of 2012, as a conservation student at UCL, I had the privilege to visit Clandon Park during a field trip. When I heard of the fire that occurred almost three years after my visit, I was shocked and devastated. My attendance to this talk was driven by a personal resonation with Clandon as well as the curiosity and fascination to see an emergency plan in use, despite the circumstances.
A personal photo of a classmate in the marble hall, 2012 and the marble hall post fire, 2015
Christine Sitwell, the Paintings Conservation Advisor for the National Trust in the UK, discussed the emergency response plan in regards to the fire at Clandon Park. The fire started quite small in a basement office on the right side of the building in the late afternoon of April 29, 2015. The fire then rose through the empty elevator shaft, enabling it to reach the lead covered roof and travel across to the left side of the building. Because of this, items and rooms on the left side, albeit still damaged, were not as badly damaged as the right side of the building. It was estimated that the amount damaged and/or completely lost totaled ninety-five percent.
Clandon Park, being under the auspices of the National Trust, has an emergency plan in place. Ironically, five weeks prior, a training procedure involving the fire brigade occurred at Clandon. Christine briefly went over the basics of the plan, including their incident reporting system. The system involves a phone tree, salvage areas to move objects, security, and something called star item sheets. These star item sheets were developed by property staff that prioritize objects as great significance to the property or of great art historical value. They are clear, simple, and to be used by the fire brigade when salvaging items. They are laminated and have two copies, one on the property as well as one in the regional office. Below are the two example slides she provided.
Once these objects have been removed from the property, they are moved to designated salvage areas, inventoried, and finally moved to more secure locations. Three of the items salvaged included three paintings that, fortunately or unfortunately, had to be cut from their frames as the paintings in their frames were much too heavy and risky to be removed together. Positively, the frames were saved as well. Clandon has bottom hanging frames just for this reason, the frames hang at the bottom for ease of removal.
Once the bulk of the items are salvaged things are not over. In addition to inventory and conservation, the next issue is security. Christine mentioned that the ease of information through the internet, smart phones, and the press increased risk of theft of items and perhaps more subsequent damage to the building. The emergency plan for Clandon Park includes a communication officer. Their duty is to be the point of up to date information regarding any changes, and updates during and immediately following an emergency. They are the point of contact with the press and the public.
Christine then shared a video diary she recorded during the aftermath of the fire. It included a school that was shut down for two days to help store some of the objects. The video diary is below.
Rescued from the ruins – a video diary of the salvage operation at Clandon Park
More issues occurred because of the many different salvage sites. A collections management system was created in a spreadsheet manner in order to determine the different levels of damage to each object within each salvage site. The building construction was damaged but intact, leaving a shell of a building. The damage was assessed with a 3D laser and the building’s structural stability was able to be evaluated. There were various other methods of surveying the damage, including a drone.
There were also the health hazards associated with the burning lead roof. The burning created about six feet of lead oxide dust and debris inside. The possible risk of mercury and asbestos poisoning was also present. Therefore, admittance had to be regulated and personnel properly outfitted in order to excavate the burnt layers to retrieve small finds.
The final part of the talk was in regards to the future of Clandon Park. It was stated that the General Director of the National Trust will rebuild Clandon Park, but to what degree. There have been instances with other National Trust properties on how they have handled such a large devastation. The options with how to handle Clandon park were to: demolish, maintain as a ruin, restore completely, reinvent for another purpose, or a use blended approach. The latter seems the most likely to occur.
To end her talk, Christine shared another video about the future of Clandon Park. The video can be seen below.
Clandon Park: The Future
Overall, it was intriguing and somber to see an emergency plan being utilized during such a destructive event. I enjoyed the fact that it was not a talk on the development of a plan in case of emergency, but rather the practice of it in the moment. Not only was this a learning experience for the National Trust and everyone involved in the process, I’m sure it meant a great deal to everyone who was present at Christine’s talk. If anyone else had the chance to visit Clandon before the fire, then you are aware of how such a startling loss this has been, not only for the local community, but for admirers around the world. I am hopeful for Clandon Park’s future.
Further information:
Clandon Park at the National Trust
Our Work at Clandon Park
44th Annual Meeting – Research and Technical Studies, May 17, "Characterizing the Age of Ancient Egyptian Manuscripts through micro-Raman Spectroscopy" by Sarah Goler
This is another session that I tweeted (@taradkennedy), so not a long post, but enough to give you the gist at least.
Ms. Goler was using micro-Raman spectroscopy for dating of Egyptian manuscript material.This is super cool because normally we’d have to take a sample of a manuscript and do carbon dating in order to determine a date of an unknown. With this method, we don’t!
So, how does it work? Essentially measurements are taken of the carbon black ink on a particular manuscript using micro-Raman spectroscopy. Using the difference in the dominant peak heights in the spectrograph with ink samples where the date is known, ratios are plotted and graphed to show dates:
So, the more plots you have, the more dates you have; and the more dates you have, the easier it is to determine the date range of an unknown manuscript.
To test that this would work, Ms. Goler analyzed a manuscript where she didn’t know the date range, but the librarian/ curator did. Using this method, she was able to date the manuscript within a 70 year range!
It was nondestructive in that the energy level of the laser used didn’t “burn up” the ink sample. One of the issues that a conservator from the University of Michigan else mentioned during the Q&A portion was that in order to get the peak response that Ms. Goler got, she would destroy the sample. Since my experience with Raman spectroscopy is zero, I can’t really speculate why Ms. Goler was successful and this other woman from U of M was not.
I did think this is a really promising technique, provided I understood the content correctly. If people have edits or corrections, be sure to comment below!
44th Annual Meeting, May 16, Research and Technical Studies, Visible-Induced Luminescence Imaging: Past, Current and Future Applications in Conservation Research, Dawn Kriss and Anna Serotta
I was excited to see the most recent update on VIL imaging as it is an accessible imaging technique that can be used to localize pigments with specific characteristics. It is useful for anyone interested in painted surfaces, and can be used in conjunction with other multispectral imaging, or as a standalone technique.
The basic idea is that you need a light source to produce visible light, a camera with its infrared filter removed, and a bandpass filter to limit the type of light that gets to the camera sensor, along with some standards to help process the images. The pigment particles on the object are excited in the visible range, and emit infrared radiation which is detected by the modified camera. This technique can be used to detect trace remains of pigments that are all but undetectable to the naked eye. The technique was developed by scientists from the British Museum and the Courtauld Institute (see Verri et al., 2009) [1].
In the case studies shown in Dawn and Anna’s presentation the focus was on Egyptian blue, which produces luminescence in the infrared (~910nm) when exposed to visible light. Optimizing the capture and processing protocols will mean better results and hopefully, a means of standardizing and sharing information between conservators working in different labs. While VIL is gaining popularity as more museums add it to their workflow (for example. as part of the APPEAR project spearheaded by the Getty), the technique is still being developed, with much more progress on the horizon. Dawn and Anna reported on results of a survey of VIL users to show where progress has been made and where we can still expect some improvements in the technique.
Capture: varying light sources
There are many options for lights used for excitation, so choosing a light source that is targeted to your research question is critical. As an example, the authors described work by my classmate Brian Castriota showing that red LEDs with an output centered at 630 nm caused greater luminescence of Egyptian blue compared to white LEDs. More research on the luminescence characteristics of other pigments will help users optimize their light sources to target specific pigments.
Processing: calibration, standards, and protocols
While many conservators using VIL use the CHARISMA protocols (developed by the British Museum), others are using Photoshop to process the images. Egyptian blue VIL images are usually shown in monochrome, but as the technique is expanded different overlays or crossfades will help communicate the results by registering the images with other photographs, as Dawn and Anna did for the images shown in their presentation. This is one of the greatest advantages of VIL: it’s very easy to understand the images that are generated and easy to communicate the results to the public. However, capturing good metadata and using appropriate standards are critical for the intercomparability of these data in the future. It will be crucial to develop a luminescence scale or target in order to compare images from institutions who may not be using the exact same capture or processing parameters.
What do we have to look forward to?
While its initial development as a tool for identifying Egyptian blue has led to its popularity among archaeological conservators, it seems like the technique is ripe for more widespread adoption for research into modern pigments, some of which also have unique luminescence properties.
Conservators can use a variety of wavelengths using targeted or tunable light sources (e.g. the CrimeScope, adapted from the forensics field) to survey visible-induced luminescent pigments (other examples of which include dragon’s blood, Indian yellow, Han blue, cadmium red and yellow). Dawn and Anna showed an example of imaging surveying cadmium pigments used in Stuart Davis’s Mellow Pad carried out by their Brooklyn colleague Jessica Ford. For more on the work from the team at the Brooklyn Museum, see their recent blog post here.
Conservators can use a variety of wavelengths using targeted or tunable light sources (e.g. the CrimeScope, adapted from the forensics field) to survey visible-induced luminescent pigments (other examples of which include dragon’s blood, Indian yellow, Han blue, cadmium red and yellow). Dawn and Anna showed an example of imaging surveying cadmium pigments used in Stuart Davis’s Mellow Pad carried out by their Brooklyn colleague Jessica Ford. For more on the work from the team at the Brooklyn Museum, see their recent blog post here.
References.
[1] Verri, Giovanni, et al. “Assyrian Colours: Pigments on a Neo-Assyrian Relief of a Parade Horse.” The British Museum Technical Research Bulletin 3 (2009): 57–62.
44th Annual Meeting – Sustainability, May 16, "Sustainable Energy Reductions without Relaxed Environmental Criteria for a Hypothetical Museum in Montreal" by William Lull
Annoyingly, my computer thought it would be a great time to crap out, but luckily I come equipped with multiple electronic devices. So, as to not let my computer get the best of me, I snapped pictures of a number of his slides, so I would catch the gist of his talk. It also helps that Bill came to Yale to give a much more extensive version of this talk to collections and facilities staff.
Good news? The talk in its entirety is available as a paper on Bill’s web site: http://publications.garrisonlull.com
Bill set up a hypothetical building scenario (10,000 sf) using Montreal as its home. Montreal uses hydro power (so cool and GREEN) for its utilities so carbon footprint isn’t a concern here, so he doesn’t talk about emission reduction in this scenario.
Institutions want to save money, so naturally, their first thought is to cut back on HVAC settings. Same with energy savings: if we change our parameters, we’ll save money AND energy! But at what risk to our collections?
The scenarios that were hypothesized were the following:
- Change lighting energy use – reduce by 1 w/sf
- Change the T/RH to the relaxed AAMD (Association of Art Museum Directors) standards
- Change the energy loads and other proposed criteria without changing the environment set points
The scenarios were tried in a collections storage space and a gallery space in the proposed building.
Now, granted, the AAMD “standards” were proposed so that we’d be more lenient in our loaning practices, and not about energy savings or anything like that. Plus, I am not sure what “science” was used to determine these guidelines, since as far as I know, no conservators or conservation scientists were part of the conversation. But that’s a bone I can pick on a different blog post. 🙂 Anyway, Bill was just using it as an example of relaxed conditions.
One important element to examine are the alternative loads and how they might affect these numbers. Reducing these loads on a system will save energy and money:
- Internal Loads
- e.g. humans, lights, computers
- turn off lights, change lamps, turn off computers not in use
- Envelope Loads
- e.g. radiant heat from the sun, glass, insulation, vapor barrier (or lack thereof)
- seal up cracks, add insulation, vapor barrier
- Outside Air Loads
- how much outside air is being let in?
- check and see how much outside air is being let in
- you need some due to ASHRAE and OSHA standards
My favorite – and simplest – solution is to change the amount of air being pushed through your HVAC system. If you don’t have constant volume supply/ return fans, slow the fans down! You’ll maintain the environment you want, and save money and energy! Just make sure air is still being distributed evenly so your conditions stay constant. And BTW, supply and return fans are NOT the same as VAV fans. Those are smaller fans that are used the condition one room at a time based on how you set the thermostat in a single room.
Other recommendations have been to shut down equipment during unoccupied times and then turn the equipment back on. Bill doesn’t recommend this for a variety of reasons:
- Wear and tear on equipment (e.g. motor belts)
- The conditions are less than ideal, especially in the summer (I’ve experienced this issue)
Bottom line? There are other ways to be smart with energy savings and STILL maintain the environmental conditions you want in your collections and exhibit spaces. So, don’t assume you need to relax your environmental standards to be a greener museum. Examine your overall building and systems with your facilities folks and see what you can find that might save you money in the long run without compromising your collections.
Super smart and super practical. This HVAC nerd gives this talk two thumbs up!
44th Annual Meeting, General Session (GO – Emergency Response), May 16, “The Emergency Response Team at the Centre de conservation du Québec” by Eloïse Paquette
The Centre de conservation du Québec (CCQ), in Québec city, is a unique institution. Founded by the Ministère de la Culture et des Communications in 1979, its mandate is to protect and preserve Quebec’s cultural heritage and to make sure that this valuable heritage is recognized as such, and made as widely available as possible. The CCQ, which provides a variety of services (ranging from restoration to raising awareness about conservation issues and to emergency response), employs thirty conservators. One of these professionals, Éloïse Paquette, Paintings Conservator at the Centre, was at the joint 44th annual meeting and 42nd annual conference on May 16 to let us in on the secrets of the CCQ’s well-rounded Emergency Response Team. I had been looking forward to this talk: as a Quebecoise, and an aspiring conservator, this was a valuable occasion to get to know the workings of the CCQ, as well as how prepared they are to face disasters that threaten cultural heritage in the Belle Province. What I found out is that the members of the Emergency Response Team of the CCQ are, as Paquette pointed out, as ready as they can be.
The ice storm of January 1998, which paralyzed the Montreal region, acted as a catalyst for the coming into being of an official Emergency Response Team at the CCQ. The crise du verglas, as it is known in Quebec, caused massive power outage. At the Lachine Museum, 10 km from downtown Montreal, leaks appeared from previously frozen pipes when the power came back on, and the storage area was flooded with hot, dirty water, critically damaging the Museum’s collections. The CCQ was called for help, and three conservators were on site two days later. 254 of the affected objects demanded immediate care: the exhibition space of the museum was turned into examination rooms, many textiles were dried or frozen on site, and others were washed then and there. 87% of the textiles were saved, and half of them can be displayed today. Some of the textiles, paintings, works on paper, ethnological objects and furniture were restored in the following years.
This disaster prompted the Lachine Museum to revise its storage space (they installed a gas heating system and revised the classification of the objects) and the CCQ to put into place a more detailed and comprehensive emergency plan. Paquette explained to the audience what this plan is, and, most importantly, how good organization and communication make it an effective one. The CCQ’s Emergency Plan, which is revised and put up to date during regular meetings, relies on cooperation between team members as well as with other institutions and museum employees. The CCQ has agreements with the Musées de la civilisation and the Musée National des Beaux-Arts in Quebec City, as well as with Centre des services du Québec – Parcs Canada.
The first aspect of the Emergency Plan which Paquette unveiled was the Telephone Pyramid, a diagram in which a network of names and phone numbers are linked one to the other, in such a way that when a member of the team receives a call telling them about an emergency, they know exactly which other members to call. Hence, everyone is quickly in the know and ready to act. Like every other document related to the Emergency Plan, this Pyramid is available in a binder at CCQ, and every team member has a copy at home. The Pyramid was also printed in credit card format, so that it is carried around at all times (as Paquette pointed out, she had her copy in her wallet during the talk). This goes to prove what is seemingly obvious, but can never be stressed enough: communication is key for efficient emergency response.
The members of the emergency team also own a pocket-size summary of the plan. In the Emergency Plan, nothing is left to chance: the sequence of events is detailed, designated facilities are pointed out, the responsibilities of each team member is exposed, contact information for CCQ’s partners in case of disaster is listed, floor plans of institutions and museums are provided, etc. The document is made complete by a few annexes, the first of which being “Salvage Material Lists.” The materials of the Emergency Response Team, which are regularly inspected, are housed together in a secure area at the Centre, in well identified boxes. On each box is taped a list of the material it contains. The materials are visible, easily accessible, and very well organized. At the end of the talk, an attendee asked Paquette, who had provided us with an example of the list of materials contained in two of the boxes (box #1: aluminum paper, waxed paper, Ziploc bags, plastic fasteners, garbage bags, polythene, and box #4: security helmets, first aid kit, security glasses, dust masks, disposable gloves, dishwashing gloves, latex gloves), what they used aluminum paper for. Paquette stated that most of the materials have no specific, set use. Instead, they are to be brought on site just in case they are needed. This whole organization of the material makes for a quick and efficient disaster response.
The emergency plan has been put to the test a few times since its inception. Paquette told the audience about two disasters that – as someone who grew up in Quebec City – I remember vividly: the burning of the Quebec’s Armoury (2008), and the fire at the Musée de la civilisation de Québec (2014).
The Voltigeurs de Québec Armoury, a Gothic Revival drill hall, was built in the later part of the 19th century. As Paquette pointed out, on top of its historical significance, the manège militaire (as it is known in Quebec) also had architectural value: it was the largest wooden structure in America without columns. Iqn the night of April 4th, 2008, as the whole of Quebec City was still preparing for the celebration of the city’s 400th birthday, the Armoury, which was to have been one of the venues of the festivities, burned to the ground. As Paquette pointed out, the building was completely lost, except for the façade and the Voltigeurs de Quebec’s Museum, located to the left of the building. Several conservators were called on site on April 5th and tried to carry out the drying of archives and paper on site, until the federal government took over the conservation of the artifacts. 90% of the collection, which was mostly archives, was saved, and the museum was relocated.
Six years later, in 2014, an electrical fire broke out on the second floor of the Musée de la civilisation de Québec. Two exhibition rooms were flooded. In the first exhibition, one that contained about 300 First Nations artifacts, the objects were quickly protected and sustained minimal damage. The second exhibition was composed of Pierre Gauvreau’s paintings, which were rapidly covered with polythene to prevent ashes from settling on the surface, since there was no more storage space available. Except for the floors of the rooms, which had to be replaced, everything remained in good condition.
After the fire at the Museum, the CCQ’s Emergency Response Team went over their performance and commented on everything that went right, and everything that went wrong. Paquette concluded her talk by sharing some of the conclusions they drew from this exercise: everyone should have a cellphone and be in constant communication during transportation and intervention; a police escort should be demanded by the team in order to avoid traffic; frontal lamps are a must; the basic needs of the team need to be taken care of; it is necessary to monitor what other people are doing on the site (for example, cleaning company employees will sometimes use products that are dangerous for the collections); and the team (and their material) should be identified. Paquette showed the blue vest that the members of the Emergency Response Team wear when they work on the site of a disaster, which makes them recognizable but also distinguishes them from firefighters and other professionals.
What really makes the Emergency Response Team at the Centre de Conservation du Québec shine is the emphasis that is put throughout their emergency plan on good communication and obsessive organization. With the material always ready to be packed in a car and brought on site, and everyone easily reachable on their phones, it seems like this team could serve as an example for other institutions that have not yet fully embarked on the emergency preparedness train. In this regard, I would like to suggest that it might be worth considering for the CCQ to make the entirety of their emergency plan publicly available. All of their hard work and planning could greatly benefit conservation professionals all over the world.
44th Annual Meeting – Research and Technical Studies, May 17, "Investigation of Fogging Glass Display Cases at the Royal Ontario Museum" by Helen Coxon et al
This was one of the sessions I tweeted (@taradkennedy), so this won’t be a long post, but I will give you a summary with lots of slide images!
So the problem: these brand-new exhibit cases were mysteriously fogging up for no apparent reason. And even better: once they were cleaned, the fog would roll right in; coming right back like a bad check. Some awesome examples of what was popping up on the inside AND the outside of the glass:
So what was this mysterious fog? Turns out it is a mix of things (it always is): definitely free sodium from the glass along with lactic acid, plasticizers, aromatic hydrocarbons… the digital shots of the GC/MS results are mostly illegible unless you have the peak locations memorized, but I did get a shot of where all of this stuff came from:
So, everything from the air around the cases to the materials that they were cleaned with to the goo that they lubricated big, heavy machines with that moved the glass pieces around like this:
So, now what? Luckily Stephen Koob, King of the Glass Conservators, had a nonionic formula that worked!
Here’s the recipe. I hope you can read it.
Hilariously, the glass manufacturer felt bad and came up with this six-stage cleaning kit for the museum to use. The museum was like… um, thanks, but no thanks. Yeah, not even the fussiest of conservators wants to do that much cleaning.
This talk was one of my favorite talks of the conference: folks presenting a practical problem in an accessible way that was thoroughly researched with a practical (nonionic) solution… SOLUTION, get it???
OK, I’ll stop now.