Julia Sybalsky
The Science Conservation team at the American Museum of Natural History recently completed a four-year Institute of Museum and Library Services funded program evaluating commonly used feather cleaning techniques and their impacts on preservation. This talk will share the findings from this extensive experimental investigation, which resulted in an interactive decision-making tool for cleaning feathers and documented best practices for treatment of feathered objects.
Over 100 cleaning techniques commonly used by allied professionals were identified through a community survey distributed broadly. An initial empirical evaluation of each technique resulted in the selection of 23 methods to evaluate more closely. Data from short- and long-term impact studies of the selected methods was interpreted using a multi-criteria decision-making technique called the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP), allowing them to be ranked according to their potential for causing damage to feathers of different types and condition states.
An interactive digital guideline for decision-making was built using rankings derived from the AHP. This tool describes best practices for cleaning, delivering customized recommendations in response to user inputs about the morphology and condition of the feathers to be cleaned, as well as risk tolerance for different types of damage. The guideline presents a clear description of each cleaning method, supported by a video tutorial for better understanding of application and technique. Potential damages associated with each method are also presented and represented in an illustrated damage typology.
The new guideline for cleaning feathers has been trialed by conservators and allied professionals representing a range of expertise and experience levels. Several case studies illustrating its application to the treatment of objects including taxidermy, feathered objects and study skins will be presented. With the benefit of feedback and insights from this field testing, the guideline has been refined into a valuable resource to help conservators and allied professionals approach cleaning decisions in a more systematic way, and to support better-informed assessment of the risks associated with cleaning feathers.