The National Gallery Pocket Guides series, beautifully illustrated from one of the greatest collections of Old Master paintings in the world, introduces central themes in the history of Western art. This GUIDE discusses the main types of conservation treatment carried out on panel and canvas paintings and the complex issues involved in cleaning and restoration. 69 color & 6 b&w illustrations.
This is a comprehensive guidebook to the fascinating aspects of the conservation and restoration of paintings. It explains clearly what happens in dealing with the confusing and multilayered problems encountered. The author discusses basic techniques, materials used in both the original paintings and in restoration, chemical formulas, the equipment and methods of handling and storage; he shows how many common pitfalls can be avoided, and offers other tips based on 30 years of experience. There are chapters on the Restorer and the Studio; Construction of Paintings; Technique of Painting; Renovation and Repair; and a bibliography, glossary and index. Eleven line drawings illustrate restoration techniques and the assembly of components.
This handsomely illustrated volume traces the intersections of art history and paintings restoration in nineteenth-century Europe. Repairing works of art and writing about them—the practices that became art conservation and art history—share a common ancestry. By the nineteenth century the two fields had become inseparably linked. While the art historical scholarship of this period has been widely studied, its restoration practices have received less scrutiny—until now. This book charts the intersections between art history and conservation in the treatment of Italian Renaissance paintings in nineteenth-century Europe. Initial chapters discuss the restoration of works by Giotto and Titian framed by the contemporary scholarship of art historians such as Jacob Burckhardt, G. B. Cavalcaselle, and Joseph Crowe that was redefining the earlier age. Subsequent chapters recount how paintings conservation was integrated into museum settings. The narrative uses period texts, unpublished archival materials, and historical photographs in probing how paintings looked at a time when scholars were writing the foundational texts of art history, and how contemporary restorers were negotiating the appearances of these works. The book proposes a model for a new conservation history, object-focused yet enriched by consideration of a wider cultural horizon.
"This volume will be of interest to teachers and students of conservation and art history, as well as to practicing conservators and museum curators, professionals in related disciplines, and others interested in art history and paintings conservation."--BOOK JACKET.
Conservation of Easel Paintings is the first comprehensive text on the history, philosophy, and methods of treatment of easel paintings that combines both theory with practice. With contributions from an international group of experts and interviews with important artists, this volume provides an all-encompassing guide to necessary background knowledge in technical art history, artists' materials, scientific methods of examination and documentation, with sections that present varying approaches and methods for treatment, including consolidation, lining, cleaning, retouching, and varnishing. The book concludes with a section featuring issues of preventive conservation, storage, shipping, exhibition, lighting, safety issues, and public outreach. Conservation of Easel Paintings is a crucial resource in the training of conservation students and will provide generations of practicing paintings conservators and interested art historians, curators, directors, collectors, dealers, artists, and students of art and art history with invaluable information and guidance.
Conservation of Easel Paintings, Second Edition provides a much-anticipated update to the previous edition, which has come to be known internationally as an invaluable and comprehensive text on the history, philosophy and methods of the treatment of easel paintings. Including 49 chapters written by more than 90 respected authors from around the world, this volume offers the necessary background knowledge in technical art history, artists’ materials and scientific methods of examination and documentation. Later sections of the book provide information about the varying approaches and methods for treatment and issues of preventive conservation, as well as valuable reflections on storage, shipping, and exhibition. Including exciting developments that have taken place since the last edition was published, the book also covers new techniques of examination, especially MacroXRF scanning and Reflectance Transmission Imagery. Drawing on research presented at recent professional conferences, information about innovative methods for cleaning modern and contemporary paintings and insights into modern oil paints is also included. Incorporating the latest regulations and understanding of health and safety practices and integrating theory with practice throughout, Conservation of Easel Paintings, Second Edition will continue to be an indispensable reference for practicing conservators. It will also be an essential resource for students taking conservation courses around the world.
Reviewed by Ruhemann/Plesters: "One of the most interesting features of this small book is the use of the term 'conservation' rather than 'restoration' in its title. Serious consideration is given to the question of environment, e. g. the importance of proper atmospheric conditions, the damaging effects of damp, sunlight, or of hanging pictures over a fireplace or exposed to lamp or candle smoke...&c.&c. Protection, as distinct from restoration, of pictures is emphasized throughout....&c &c."The cleaning of paintings, p. 392.
This volume presents the proceedings of an international symposium organized by the Getty Conservation Institute and the J. Paul Getty Museum. The first conference of its kind in twenty years, the symposium assembled an international group of conservators of painted panels, and gave them the opportunity to discuss their philosophies and share their work methods. Illustrated in color throughout, this volume presents thirty-one papers grouped into four topic areas: Wood Science and Technology, History of Panel-Manufacturing Techniques, History of the Structural Conservation of Panel Paintings, and Current Approaches to the Structural Conservation of Panel Paintings.
For more than six centuries, European painters have been ambitious to depict objects as if they possessed volume, placing them in a space that seems equivalent to the real space of our world. This "fiction" was central to the artist's purpose. Through a close examination of paintings from the 1400s to the early 20th century, including works by Uccello, Vermeer, Titian, and Monet, Nicholas Penny explains in this latest title in the National Gallery's Closer Look series how artists sought to make the fiction of pictorial space compelling, not only through the use of linear or aerial perspective, but also through the choice and intensity of color, the variations in light, and the texture of the painted surface. Published by National Gallery Company/Distributed by Yale University Press
