Oil painting damaged by water

Christine Fillion <christine.m.fillion<-at->sympatico<.>ca> writes

>A large format contemporary oil painting with no varnish layer was
>damaged by flooding while in storage.  The water streamed down the
>painting and the result is that long and very shiny drip lines are
>very visible in oblique lighting.  It appears that the surface of
>the painting has been reformed in the area of the drips and appear
>very shiny.  Does anyone have experience with this type of damage?
>Is there some way that the shiny drip lines can at least be reduced?

I recently restored a large painting (60 in by 171 inches) on canvas
that is over 120 years old.  It had been in a flood and was water
damaged.  I searched the literature and I was surprised by the lack
of publication or mention of treatment of such paintings, especially
the rare restudy to determine the effectiveness of treatment (as
success in the most basic terms).  Damage to the Corning Museum by
Hurricane Agnes resulted in a flood of the museum and one painting
in particular was covered with mud.  This was reported on in the
JAIC (1977, Volume 16, Number 2, Article 3, pp. 21-26) by David
Goist and he treated it at the old Cooperstown lab:

    <URL:http://cool.conservation-us.org/jaic/articles/jaic16-02-003_indx.html>

It was a successful treatment, as over 30 years later Corning
conservator Steven Koob kindly examined the condition of the
painting and found it in good condition.  While this may not solve
your immediate problem, similar insults can provide important clues
to treatment and future damage or deterioration.  Few other
treatments have appeared in print of this problem.  I was surprised
to be unsuccessful in finding any information on the floods in Italy
in Florence in the late 1960s.  One conservator who (as a foreign
student) had worked on paintings there, did contact me but no
Italian conservator or others who treated any of the paintings have
published their treatments (or responded to my queries) and/or made
restudies of the success of the treatments.  My own examination of a
number of paintings that were damaged in the floods (in Florence)
indicates that the treatments were successful, but it would be of
interest to know the methods.

One thing does come to mind, you might have the surface analyzed to
determine what was in the water, while a "shiny" surface coating
could be anything from mica to an organic material, a clear analysis
might lead to a treatment design.

Niccolo Caldararo, Ph.D.
Conservation Art Service
San Francisco


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                  Conservation DistList Instance 29:45
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