Paper damaged by silverfish

I am treating a colour paper object very badly damaged by silverfish
attack.

I would like to know your opinion about whether the missing image
areas should or should not be retouched, or perhaps be retouched on
top of an isolating layer which would make it reversible (methyl
cellulose layer?).

There are two conflicting ethical principles here:

    1.  The object should be returned to its original aesthetic
        integrity

    2.  You should never retouch on original substrate (after all,
        what you see on the eaten away areas is original primary
        support!)

Anyone having experience or just an opinion about this, please
reply,

Eneko Fraile-Ugalde
MA-Conservation
University of Northumbria
NE1 8ST Newcastle
UK


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                  Conservation DistList Instance 13:48
                  Distributed: Friday, March 24, 2000
                       Message Id: cdl-13-48-035
                                  ***