Discover Top Posts Tagged with #art conservators

This display in Ashmolean Museum shows how touching artwork affects material.

#ashmolean museum #touch #natural oils #paper #wood #corrosion #fragile surfaces #museum objects #storeroom #museums #art #artifacts #art conservation #art conservators #how does touching affect materials?

This is the old church of Sant Andreu de Vila-Robau (Comarques Gironines, Catalonia). It was built in the 10th century, and its inside is (was?) covered in fresco paintings from the 12th century.

It’s deteriorating; but, like many other small villages, the city council doesn’t have the resources to take care of it and preserve it. In fact, the inhabitants of many rural areas like this one lack even basic infrastructure such as public transport to go to the near villages. The city council has asked the public administration for funding, but there isn’t enough for all the heritage sites in the country, so they haven’t received any. Meanwhile, without any treatment, the paintings keep deteriorating.

Photos by Jordi Borràs published in La Mira.

So much happens behind-the-scenes of a Museum, and even more so within a conservation lab. Tune in to our latest video with Lisa Bruno, Carol Lee Shen Chief Conservator, for peek into how we care for our collections—from reversing outdated treatments to stories behind recent projects and what took place when the Museum shut down due to COVID-19.

Video by Anne Sofie Nørskov, Joanne Leonhardt Cassullo Video Fellow⁠ Treatments featured: William Williams, Deborah Hall (1766) ⇨ Cecily Brown (British, born 1969). Triumph of the Vanities II, 2018. Purchase gift of John and Barbara Vogelstein in honor of Anne Pasternak © artist or artist's estate⁠ ⇨ Assyrian reliefs, Neo-Assyrian Period, reign of Ashur-nasir-pal II, circa 883–859 B.C.E. Funding for the conservation of the Assyrian Reliefs was generously provided through a grant from the Bank of America Art Conservation Project.⁠

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Today is #AskAConservator Day! To celebrate the growth of the field, our #BkMConservation staff will be answering your questions today from 9am-5pm EST.

The BkM Conservation lab is one of the oldest in the country, starting in 1934 by two pioneer paintings conservators, Sheldon and Caroline Keck. Since then, our lab has expanded and is made up of ten conservators, four interns working across paper, painting, and object conservation as well as four Collection Management staff. Our conservators worked on approximately 840 objects and artworks this year while our Collections Management team has worked on multiple large, long-term storage/rehousing projects across all our collections. Have a question for any of them? Leave it for them here!

Photo by Walter Andersons

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Every time such a press conference is given, an art conservator dies..