Subject: Relaxing climate control
I would like to read people's reaction to this recent article by Javier Pes in The Art Newspaper issue 212, April 2010: "Indianapolis relaxes climate controls: Leading directors have been questioning the scientific validity-and cost-of running air conditioning to the current standard specification" By Javier Pes From issue 212, April 2010 Published online 8 Apr 10, 2010 (Museums) (c) The Art Newspaper 2010 <URL:http://www.theartnewspaper.com/ articles/Indianapolis-relaxes-climate-controls/20440> "The Indianapolis Museum of Art (IMA) has come off the 'gold standard' of museum environmental control in a unilateral move made without fanfare in February. The internationally observed standard is a temperature range of 18 to 25 degrees Celsius and relative humidity between 40 and 50 per cent, which is also a standard condition for loans. The IMA will allow the range of its exhibition gallery's temperature and relative humidity to fluctuate by a few degrees on either side of the standard. ... **** Moderator's comments: The piece quoted above has been truncated; there is additional text in the article. There is, in the same issue a piece by Maxwell Anderson, Director and Chief Executive of the Indianapolis Museum of Art: "Revising the gold standard of environmental control" There is an impasse preventing the world's art museums from adopting less stringent standards" Maxwell Anderson From issue 212, April 2010 Published online 8 Apr 10, 2010 (opinion) <URL:http://www.theartnewspaper.com/ articles/Revising-the-gold-standard-of- environmental-control%20/20549> **** Moderator's comments: The above URLs have been wrapped for email. There should be no newlines. Here at the Canadian Centre for Architecture we gradual ramp down our humidity levels in our exhibition galleries in winter to avoid condensation damage to our building in our extremely cold winter. We report our lower winter RH range on our Standard Facilities Report and have never been refused a loan because of it. I have wondered lately the possibility of museums relaxing climate control in order to "save the planet", which deserves saving as much as our collections do. What do others think? Karen Potje Chef, Service de la conservation/restauration Centre Canadien d'Architecture *** Conservation DistList Instance 23:42 Distributed: Wednesday, April 28, 2010 Message Id: cdl-23-42-017 ***Received on Monday, 19 April, 2010