Hi friends of this blog, for today, Condition problems with 19th c. maritime paintings and a
testimonial,
See short video of painting conservation lab tour: http://www.FineArtConservationLab.com
For other art conservation testimonials: http://www.fineartconservationlab.com/testimonials/
Leave a comment. Give this video a THUMBS UP!
Contact info
Scott M. Haskins, Virginia Panizzon, Oriana Montemurro (art
conservators)
805 564 3438
Call to discuss your questions. FACL does pick up and
delivery from Monterey/Carmel CA to San Diego, CA, throughout the LA area and
in Las Vegas and SLC, UT. We travel nationwide to work on murals.
19th c. Oil Painting Restoration Caveats and Tips for
Vintage Art Collectors - Maritime Painting Exam Notes
It may surprise you that many of the paintings of ships that
highlight a particular ship with its flags and name clearly visible are
actually a portrait of the ship. Portraits of ships were very popular at the
middle and the end of the 1800s. It is also interesting to know that many of
these paintings of ships hung in the cabins of the ship in the painting.
Therefore some of these paintings have had serious time at sea.
It is very common, therefore, that maritime paintings have
been in very bad conditions and circumstances. Bouncing around the ocean along
with the ship is only part of the problem. Of course high humidity and actual
water are serious problems. And you can imagine as things swing around the
cabin in high seas how easy it is that these paintings on canvas get punctured
and ripped. If you don’t already know, 19th century oil paintings (of all kinds
of paintings from all countries) have extremely brittle fabric as they age...
and rip easily.
Another serious setback to the normal health of paintings of
ships is the fact that people on the ships are used to fixing everything themselves
so when the painting needed cleaning or needed a rip repaired or needed new
varnish it was worked on by the handy guy on the ship with poor quality
materials and bad restoration techniques. They had no idea what materials and
art conservation techniques helped or hurt long term preservation.
It is, in fact, surprising to find a 19th century maritime
painting that hasn’t been treated very poorly and repaired very poorly.
Up to now I've been talking about portraits of ships for
ocean vessels. You can imagine that river and lake vessels would not be so hard
on a painting as in the ocean. But still, life on a boat is not ideal for the
long term preservation of an oil painting.
Given how common inept restorations are on these types of
paintings, some of the common things that I've encountered may be good for you
to know:
• If you own a maritime painting and have to get an
appraisal. The supposed value could be quite different than the actual value
once the actual condition is determined. For instance, one of the types of
damage that first results in a substantial decrease in value is damage to the
rigging from cleaning. Redrawing or repainting the missing rigging does not
restore the value on the open market, according to the dealers that I have
worked with.
• If you are thinking of buying a painting of a ship, this
“tip” could save you $10,000’s either from paying too much or to give you
something to use to negotiate.
Consider also the following condition issues on maritime
paintings:
a. Other easily damaged details are white water caps and
foam in the water easily removed when paintings are scrubbed.
b. 19th century maritime paintings often are painted with a
porous paint quality that is easily stained in the clouds in the sky. In
addition the ground layer or the gesso layer under the paint is often easily
stained while aging as it was common to brush the back of the painting with the
resin that discolored badly. Most of the pigments on these paintings are
transparent and so the staining of the gesso or ground layers show through.
Almost all of the old varnishes used to coat these paintings
were resins and varnishes that were used on ships. That means they discolored
very badly and do-it-yourself-urs find it very difficult to remove without
damaging the original paint.
Once scrubbed, repainting is done with a big brush and oil
paint, which of course, does additional damage and further erodes the value and
authenticity. Here is short video showing some paintings that were in our art
conservation lab recently. It includes the testimonial of a painting’s owner
who decided to do a partial treatment to improve (remove the previous poor
quality restorations) the appearance of just the water.
What do you think? How “worth it” is this type of partial
restoration treatment? Leave a comment. Give this video a THUMBS UP!
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