Volume 6, Number 1, Jan. 1984, pp.8-9

Profile: Conservation Laboratories at the Getty Museum

The Getty Museum has three conservation departments and all three are planning to move into expanded new facilities on the Malibu property sometime during 1984. These laboratories care for the museum's collections and it is envisioned that they will coordinate with and receive services from the Getty Conservation Institute.

Paintings Conservation

Under the direction of Andreas Rothe, Head Paintings Conservator, and with the addition of Mark Leonard as Associate Conservator, the Paintings Conservation Department continues to work on the museum's growing collection and is actively involved with potential new acquisitions.

The department will be welcoming six guest conservators over the coming year: Pinin Brambilla Barcillon, a private conservator working in Milan on Leonardo's Last Supper; Paolo Cadorin, Chief Restorer at the Kuntsmuseum in Basel, Switzerland; Giovanni Marussich, a private woodworker from Florence; Barbara Schleicher, a private conservator from Florence; Hubert von Sonnenberg, Director of the Doerner Institute in Munich; Gianluigi Colalucci, of the Vatican Collections, currently working on Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel ceiling.

Decorative Arts Conservation

The Decorative Arts Department is headed by Barbara Roberts, Conservator of Decorative Arts. Graham Powell, Associate Conservator, joined the lab at the end of July 1983. He is a furniture conservator with additional training in the conservation of boisserie. Brian Considine, Assistant Conservator, spent the month of December at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, at the kind invitation of the Furniture and Woodwork Conservation Department. He studied gilding with Malcolm Green. Diane Biehl has returned to the department as secretary.

The department has invited David Hawkins, private furniture conservator in England, and Mons. Pierre Ramond, lecturer at the Ecole Boulle in Paris, as guest conservators in April and July 1984, respectively.

Antiquities Conservation

The Antiquities Conservation Department, headed by Zdravko Barov, has six full-time conservators, one part-time, one consultant conservator and three volunteers. The lab also has two scientists as part-time consultants.

While the staff is working on the museum's collection and new acquisitions, it is also devoting time to several material research projects:

• Comparative tests for stone adhesives;
• New fill materials for ceramic conservation;
• Coating of metal objects with vapor deposited polyparaxylene;
• Display materials for cases containing silver objects.

Antiquities conservation routinely treats ancient objects of stone, metal, ceramic, terracotta, wall paintings, mosaics and so on. In its new facilities, the lab is hoping to install specialized equipment which will allow the treatment of a larger variety of objects.

During 1983-84 Patricia Tuttle, Assistant Conservator, is attending a training program at the Fogg Art Museum of Harvard University in Boston.

During 1984 the department's guest conservator will be E. van de Wetering. Mr. Wetering who specializes in the ethical and aesthetic problems of conservation, will be visiting from the Central Research Laboratory in Amsterdam.