Photo: @risdmuseum on Instagram.
Conservator Ingrid Neuman (left) with Rhode Island School of Design undergrad student Sophie Bugat, doing repair work on a statue of Pan.
When a new artwork is acquired by a museum, it doesn’t go right on display. At least one expert must look it over and make sure it’s in good shape.
At the Rhode Island School of Design [RISD ] in Providence that expert is often Ingrid Neuman.
Kristine Yang writes at the Providence Eye, “This past November, Ingrid Neuman, senior conservator at the RISD Museum, wheeled a twelfth-century Japanese wooden Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara into Hasbro Children’s Hospital for a CAT scan. Conservators have repaired the ancient figure, a revered Buddhist symbol, over centuries — Neuman’s examination would reveal exactly where and how they had carried out those repairs. …
“Over time, sculptures accumulate dirt and often chip, show wear, or even break. Some arrive with broken parts or past repair attempts that complicate restoration. Preparing these pieces for public exhibition falls to the museum’s conservation team.
“Through a meticulous process that integrates chemistry, art history, and craftsmanship, conservators work to stabilize and restore each object. … Neuman’s background in organic chemistry is essential to her work. Sculptures are vulnerable to a host of natural forces over time such as ultraviolet radiation, pollution, humidity, and fluctuations in temperature – all of which can degrade original materials. Pieces with organic materials like wood and ivory, along with metals such as bronze or iron, are particularly prone to these ‘agents of deterioration’ and can experience accelerated degradation if not properly maintained, says Neuman.
‘An ancient bronze beaker from China wants to corrode. It wants to go back to its original copper ore,’ says Neuman. ‘We’re trying to keep it from doing that.’
“Corrosion is a natural chemical reaction that occurs when metals like bronze are exposed to oxygen, moisture, or pollutants over time. This reaction, called oxidation, causes the metal to slowly break down. Left unchecked, this chemical process can eat away at the surface of a sculpture. …
” ‘We borrow a lot of techniques from dentists and doctors,’ says Neuman. ‘There’s a lot of overlap with the medical field.’ With limited in-house instrumentation at the RISD Museum, Neuman often relies on nearby hospitals such as Hasbro’s and research institutions for specialized evaluations.
“Understanding a sculpture’s composition and preservation history is crucial, as it directly informs the selection of repair materials. … Conservators intentionally choose repair materials that are visually similar to the original but chemically distinct, ensuring that their work can be easily differentiated from the artist’s upon chemical evaluation.
“ ‘We don’t like to use the same materials as the artist,’ Neuman says. ‘We’re not trying to be the artist, or be better than the artist, or confuse people.’
“The ease with which any added materials can be removed is also a crucial consideration for conservators, as they must ensure that any restoration work can be undone without damaging the original piece. …
“For this reason, conservators use inpainting – a technique used to fill in missing parts of an artwork – with materials that can be easily distinguished and removed. For example, Neuman says conservators often use acrylic paint when filling in an oil painting. Acrylic is water-based and chemically different from oil paint, allowing it to be safely removed. …
“Neuman emphasizes the importance of reversibility and the chemical properties of adhesives. ‘There’s so many glues in the world. A zillion,’ she says. ‘Everyone uses epoxy or Gorilla Glue, but we never use them because they’re too strong.’
“If conservators use a glue that is stronger than the sculpture’s original material, any physical stress on the object could result in new fractures, rather than breaking along existing lines. … She prepares her own adhesives in the lab, including wheat starch paste and Funori, a traditional Japanese adhesive made from seaweed — both of which are gentle yet effective enough for conservation work.
“While conservators intentionally make their repairs distinguishable from the original through their selection of materials, their work must remain invisible to the viewer. … This means conservators must address each deformity with painstaking precision and care. Inpainting demands an especially detailed approach. … Neuman says, ‘You have to use a very tiny brush, with only a few hairs in it, and you have to be really good at color matching.’
“One of the challenges of inpainting is a color perception phenomenon called metamerism, where colors that match under one light source may look different under another. … To navigate this, she moves the piece back and forth on wheeled carts between her sunlit lab and the gallery space to ensure the colors match under different lighting conditions.
“Once the restoration is complete, detailed documentation is essential, Neuman says. Photographs of the piece before, during, and after the process, along with written records, are uploaded to the museum’s database for future conservators’ reference. ‘It’s important to leave a record,’ Neuman says.”
More at the Providence Eye, here. This story reminds me of the work that Sotheby’s did on one of my mother’s Pousette-Dart paintings, one that had been too close to a chimney fire!
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