Volume 8, Number 1, Jan. 1986, pp.15-18

Regional News

San Francisco

The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco have three new conservators: Lesley Bone, ethnographic art, Sarah Gates, textiles, and Kristin Hoermann, paintings.

Bob Futernick recently taught a week-long seminar on techniques and innovations in a paper conservation course given by ICCROM in Rome.

Robin Tichane reports that he and Ann Marks-Korematsu have collaborated on a project involving the restoration of a 18th Century European landscape, using both oriental paper and western painting conservation techniques.

Los Angeles

On November 1, 1985, Dr. Chandra Reedy became an Andrew W. Mellon Fellow in Conservation Research at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Her current project is the technical analysis of Himalayan bronzes for provenance determination. This was also the subject of her doctoral dissertation.

Rosa Lowinger, a 1982 graduate of the Conservation Program at the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, is currently a NEA Fellow in Objects Conservation at LACMA. The grant extends through August 1986. In addition, Rosa has just become a Professional Associate of AIC.

Nancy Purinton, a 1985 graduate of the Winterthur/University of Delaware Art Conservation Program, is a NEA Fellow in Paper Conservation at LACMA through June 1986. She has begun a study of pigments found on Persian miniature paintings from the 15th to 17th centuries. Among the analytical techniques she is using are X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction and polarized light microscopy.

On August 29, 1985, Lilli and Steve Cristin-Poucher became parents of a baby boy, Jessie Steven.

On November 21st John Twilley joined the staff of the Conservation Center at LACMA. As Senior Research Chemist he will be responsible for the Scientific Section of the department both in support of ongoing conservation work and in research and testing among the collections. His teaching responsibilities at the University of California at Riverside remain unchanged. Former telephone numbers at Teledyne Microelectronics are obsolete and should be replaced with the following daytime numbers at LACMA: office; (213) 857-6010, lab; 857-6160.

Billie Milam has accepted the position of Sculpture and Decorative Arts Conservator at the J. Paul Getty Museum. She is looking forward to organizing a sculpture conservation lab within the existing decorative arts conservation facility. Billie has left the position of Senior Art Conservator in charge of all three dimensional art objects after 11 years at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. She looks forward to maintaining close ties with LACMA, and to a continued exchange of ideas between the two institutions.

Steve Cristin-Poucher has been appointed acting Head of Objects Conservation at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

George Johnson has joined the Decorative Arts and Sculpture Conservation Lab at the J. Paul Getty Museum as Assistant Conservator/Mountmaker. George was formerly the Exhibitions Designer at the Museum of Cultural History, U.C.L.A.

Jim Druzik, formerly Research Chemist with the Los Angeles County Museum of Art has been appointed Associate Scientist Research Contracts, at the Getty Conservation Institute, in Marina del Rey. His responsibilities will include monitoring outside projects and research contracts in the U.S. and abroad. He will also be involved with in-house research projects.

Jane Bassett will be leaving the Museum of Cultural History at U.C.L.A. to become Assistant Conservator of Ethnographic and Archaeological materials at the Pacific Regional Center in Honolulu, Hawaii.

The Paintings Conservation Laboratory at the J. Paul Getty Museum will be moving to their new facilities at the Ranch House in February.

Elisabeth and Michael Mention are proud to announce the birth of Jacqueline Mention on October 9, 1985. Elisabeth is currently on maternity leave from the Painting Conservation lab at the J. Paul Getty Museum.

Robert Keefe has been hired as frame specialist by the J. Paul Getty Museum. His responsibilities will include the conservation of old frames and the building of new frames through the Painting Conservation Laboratory.

Bill Adair held a Gilding Workshop at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art on October 31-November 1, 1985. The workshop was organized by the curatorial staff at the museum. It was enjoyed by all who attended.

Jim Greaves has resigned from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art to expand his private practice: Conservation Services. Jim had been back with LACMA since 1977, serving as Acting Head Conservator and for the past five years as Senior Paintings Conservator. He will maintain a consulting relationship with LACMA and will retain his relationship as Consulting Conservator to the Huntington Art Gallery and several other area institutions. He is currently conducting a survey of the American paintings in the High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Georgia.

Southern California

Ramon Sanchez-Chapellin, Chief Restorer at the Centro de Conservacion, Instituto Autonomo Biblioteca Nacional, Caracas, Venezuela, has joined Janet Ruggles at the paper conservation laboratory of BACC for a one year internship. Lidija Avbelj, Academic Conservation Specialist at the Restavratorski Center of SR Slovenije, Ljubljana, Yugoslavia, has joined the painting conservation laboratory of BACC for a one year internship. Dina Venezia, volunteer assistant in the painting conservation laboratory of BACC, will depart February 1986 for six months of personal study at various studios in Italy. Gary Alden reports that he took a temporary job this season as Santa Claus at a local shopping mall.

Rocky Mountains

The Rocky Mountain Regional Conservation Center has hired a new business manager, Guilbert Brown (no, we did not steal him from the AIC!). Gil will be streamlining the business end of our operation, and will be writing grants, doing public relations, and generally taking on many of the nonconservation projects previously shared by the rest of the staff.

The RMRCC conducted the first four of sixteen workshops on collections care sponsored by a grant from the National Museum Act. The workshops were held at the State Historical Society of North Dakota, and were on the care of textiles and objects. The workshops are directed toward small and under-funded museums and historic societies in the upper Plains and Rocky Mountain States.

Carl Patterson spoke at the American Association of State and Local History Convention held in Topeka, Kansas on preservation within historic houses.

Bob McCarroll spoke at the Mountain-Plains Museum Association's Preconference Exhibit Workshop. In conjunction with Jim Stahl of the Getty, Bob spoke on matting and mounting techniques for works of art on paper. Bob also spoke at a workshop at the State Historical Society of Colorado sponsored by a grant from the Colorado Local Assistance program on the care of paper collections in museum archives.

Jim Swope spoke to the Nebraska Arts Association at the Sheldon Memorial Art Gallery, University of Nebraska, at Lincoln. He was asked to discuss the philosophical and ethical considerations of several treatments done at the RMRCC funded partially by the National Endowment for the Arts.

Jeanne Brako has been working at the School of American Research in Santa Fe, New Mexico on their collection of Native American textiles. The project, which also involves Kate Peck Kent in a curatorial capacity, is funded by a grant from the National Science Foundation.

Both Carl and Jeanne responded to the need for emergency assistance at the Wyoming State Museums following severe flooding as a result of an enormous cloudburst directly over Laramie, Wyoming.

Jose Orraca returned to the RMRCC as a visiting colleague this fall. His visit, funded by a matching grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, included work on photographic treatments as well as several surveys of regional photographic collections.

Oregon and Washington

Sandy Troon, Conservation Assistant at the Portland Art Museum has accepted an internship at Hampton Court Palace, Textile Centre, in England for fall 1986.

The Portland Art Museum has received a $25,000.00 IMS grant to construct climate control cases for paintings in the Kress collection, 13th-15th centuries.

Elizabeth Chambers has been volunteering in the conservation lab at the Portland Museum, working part time, on pieces requiring paper conservation.

In conjunction with the exhibition "British Watercolors: Drawings of the 18th and 15th Centuries" from the Yale Center for British Art, the Portland Art Association presented a symposium on 30 November 1985 entitled: "Watercolor Painting: The History, Technique and Contemporary Uses of a Medium."

On 8 November, a day-long seminar for the Oregon Museum Association was held at the Oregon Historical Society. Subject: object conservation, to coincide with the new exhibit at the Society "First Aid for Artifacts," a joint project between OHS and the Northwest Conservation Center. Sonja Sopher, conservator, Portland Art Museum; John Barrett, wooden objects conservator, Northwest Conservation Center; Sam Bush, private conservator, wooden objects; Jerome Verrijden, private conservator, precious metals; Bernadette Breau, book conservator, Thompson Conservation Laboratory, spoke.

The seminar featured three videotapes by Istor Productions: "Museum Mounting: A Primer", "Paper Cleaning: Wet and Dry Methods", and "Conservation at the Oregon Historical Society: Objects". Istor Productions has just completed a ten minute videotape entitled "Scagliola: the Manufacture of Artificial Marble." Next month, production will begin on two videotapes, one will be on manuscript illumination, featuring Joyce Grafe, a Portland artist working in the manuscript tradition. The second videotape will be about the manufacture of parchment and parchment-making tools.

Gudrun Aurand is completing a three month internship in book conservation here at the Thompson Conservation Lab; and Julia Thompson has recently begun an 8-10 month internship in paper conservation.

Arizona

Nancy Odegaard, Arizona State Museum objects conservator, spent six weeks last summer at Kourion, Cyprus. This is a late Roman site which was totally destroyed in 365 A.D. by an earthquake. The proximity of the quake's epicenter created such complete destruction that the site was never resettled. In essence, time froze leaving artifacts and bodies untouched within the rubble. The dig is under the direction of Dr. David Soren, Head of Classics, University of Arizona, consisted of six other conservators and included Nancy's intern, Jessica Johnson. They treated coins, wall painting fragments, bronze vessels, glass, mosaic fragments, and ceramics. Nancy is also involved in a condition and storage improvement project for over 500 Cordroy Mexican masks at the museum.

Robert Herskowitz, Arizona Heritage Center objects conservator (Tucson), spoke on native tanned leather last August at the Buffalo Bill Historical Center, Cody, Wyoming. He has recently been appointed to serve on a board which provides technical information about conservation services for new facilities that the Arizona Heritage Center is planning to construct in Phoenix.

He reports that their IMS grant for textile conservation survey is moving right along. Survey data concerning the Center's textiles are now being entered into computers.

The Center has hired Vickie Cassman as a textile conservator. A Winterthur grad, Vickie just finished her one year internship at Hampton Court.