Saving Art Through Science

In 17th century Flanders, Peter Paul Rubens did conservation work on his own paintings with the tools of his day: oil paints and a brush.

Masterpieces by Rubens and Rembrandt are still being restored in the late 20th century, but now the task is entrusted to trained conservators using high-tech methods that include irradiating canvases with nuclear particles to create X-ray film that shows each discrete stage in the artist’s painting process.

“The more we can know about a painting, the better,” explains Joseph Fronek, head of paintings conservation at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. “Because of advances in scientific analysis and the synthetic materials that are available to conservators, we’re better able to understand how things were done, and that helps us do a better job in restoration.”

Contemporary conservators have advanced degrees in art history and restoration, and, unlike Rubens, know their way around infrared spectroscopy and binocular microscopes that can magnify details of paintings by 400 times. Right now, for instance, Fronek is working on an 18th century French painting the museum recently purchased.

“There’s an area in the upper corner of sky that looks discolored, and I’m not sure if it’s original paint or later addition, so I’m using a binocular microscope to examine it,” Fronek says.

Large museums such as the Getty, LACMA and the Smithsonian typically contain in-house science labs and scientists who work closely with conservators. Using tools adapted from industry, conservators can even repair single threads in 4-century-old canvases.

They can also do the artistic equivalent of peeking through a historic keyhole to observe preparatory sketches that lie buried under layers of paint and varnish.

“In the last 50 years, conservators have relied heavily on X-rays and microscopes, but in the last 10 years with digital chips, infrared has really transformed what we can see under the surface of a painting,” says Jay Krueger, president of the American Institute for Conservation in Washington.

It’s not only the old masters that need restoration. Contemporary works can be damaged in shipment or storage, exposed to light or dirt and even vandalized. Conservators want to know as much as they can about a painting before they begin work.

Perhaps the most powerful technology of all was used on a LACMA-owned work by Albert Pinkham Ryder, a 19th century American painter. The canvas was shipped to the Smithsonian, then taken to a nuclear plant and subjected to auto-radiography, which uses nuclear radiation to expose film taken of the painting over several weeks to show the different stages of Pinkham’s work.

“With auto-radiography, one is able to see more clearly the first lines he laid out and then the subsequent stages of the painting,” Fronek explains.

Fronek turned a lifelong passion for art into a profession by earning a master’s degree in art history and completing a professional degree in art conservation from New York University. The LACMA conservator says there are three top schools to choose from: NYU, State University of New York at Buffalo and the University of Delaware.

There, students are trained in science, art history and conservation. Once they enter the job market, salaries range from $20,000 to $120,000, depending on experience and administrative duties, says Penny Jones, executive director of the American Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works.Fronek’s restorations often start with research into a painter’s other works. These days, he can tap into online libraries and use e-mail to confer with colleagues around the globe. Some museums also have their holdings on CD-ROM, providing vivid color reproductions of famous works.

“In terms of educational and technical resources, conservators are taking ever more advantage of resources on the Web,” says Krueger, who is also senior conservator with the National Gallery in Washington.

That means that if Fronek is trying to restore a Monet, he could compare it with other examples of the artist’s work online. Of course, such an important project would ultimately require trips to see other Monets, because duplicated images can never match the original. But the technology now provides conservators such as Fronek with a good head start.

Freelance writer Denise Hamilton can be reached at hamilton@loop.com.

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AT A GLANCE

Name: Joseph Fronek

Education: Master’s in art history from NYU and a professional degree in art conservation. Bachelor’s in Liberal studies, University of St. Thomas in Houston. Also, studied at Doerner Institute in Munich, Germany.

Age: 47

Experience: 1966-present, senior paintings conservator and head of paintings conservation, LACMA; 1983-1986, head of conservation for the Art Museums at the University of Texas; 1981-83, fellowship at he Metropolitan Museum in New York.