Calcium oxalate on easel paintings

Flavia de Souza <fluksy2000 [at] hotmail__com> writes

>I am a conservation student currently writing my thesis on calcium
>oxalate film encountered on easel paintings. ...
>...
>... In my review I intend to
>summarize the analysis methods performed for identification of
>calcium oxalate ...

I presented a paper with Beth Price and Andrew Lins, "The
characterisation of degraded, oxalate-rich surface layers on
paintings", at the IRUG7 Conference, New York, in 2006. Our summary
in the conference book of abstracts describes the occurrence of
calcium oxalates on easel paintings and other non-calcareous
substrates, and includes a short bibliography. I can send the
abstract to you, and would be happy to discuss this with you
further. In our study at the Philadelphia Museum of Art we used
FTIR, SEM-EDS, XRD and GCMS analyses to characterise oxalate-rich
surface layers on a number of objects including Italian paintings
from the 14th and 16th centuries. Oxalates on paintings have also
been studied recently by Catherine Higgitt, Marika Spring and
colleagues (see National Gallery Technical Bulletin v.26, 2005) and
Annelies van Loon (Colour Changes and Chemical Reactivity in
Seventeenth Century Oil Paintings, PhD Thesis, University of
Amsterdam, 2008). Aside from easel paintings, there have been many
studies of oxalates on calcareous substrates (stone, fresco).

Ken Sutherland
Scientist
Philadelphia Museum of Art
Conservation Department
Box 7646
Philadelphia, PA 19101


                                  ***
                  Conservation DistList Instance 22:58
                  Distributed: Sunday, April 12, 2009
                       Message Id: cdl-22-58-006
                                  ***