Volume 13, Number 1, Jan. 1991, pp.11-15

Regional News

Hawaii

The Pacific Regional Conservation Center (PRCC) is pleased to announce our move into new laboratories in the recently constructed Castle Memorial Building at Bishop Museum. The custom-designed labs have 20-foot ceilings with floor to ceiling north-facing windows, Nederman fume extraction systems, large fume hoods, track lighting and beautiful views of the Waianae mountain range. The Conservation Center occupies the entire fourth floor and includes separate paintings, paper and objects labs as well as a photographic studio, dark room, preparation lab, library/conference room and administrative offices. We enthusiastically invite all of you to visit us.

Diana Dicus has recently begun a one-year Mellon Fellowship in ethnographic conservation at PRCC. Diana received her degree in conservation from the Institute of Archaeology in London. Jeff Kimball has been hired as Objects Conservator at PRCC. Jeff also graduated from the Institute of Archaeology and spent last year as our Mellon Fellow. Other staff additions include Melissa Arnold who we welcome as Conservation Technician.

In early November, Linda Hee attended the Harpers Ferry Regional Textile Group conference and the Display Materials Workshop at the Smithsonian's Conservation Analytical Lab.

Dale Kronkright attended the Enzyme Treatments seminar sponsored by MIT and Technology and Conservation magazine. Dale and Larry Pace, who attended the "New Methods in the Cleaning of Paintings" workshop at the Getty Conservation Institute in August, plan to give a mini-workshop to their workmates at PRCC to share and compare notes.

Paintings Conservator Perry Hurt of Fredericksburg, Virginia, spent a month with Larry helping with various projects in the Paintings Lab.

Lynne Gilliland, Paper Conservator at the Smithsonian's Museum of American History, also spent a month at PRCC working with Downey Manoukian in PRCC's Paper Lab.

The Maui Historical Society, operating the Bailey House Museum in Wailuku Maui, is one of the newer WAAC members. The MHS collections focus on pre-contact Hawaiian cultural materials (pre-1778) and artifacts from the Missionary Era (1820-75). Objects conservator Valerie Free, of the Maui Historical Society, reports that a cadre of volunteer collections management assistants logged over 1,800 hours of service during the first year of the society's Collections Management Program, now in its second year. The Coll. Mgt. Program received an IMS Cons.Project Award of $19,170 for 1990-91 which will enable the museum to upgrade environmental conditions of its existing exhibits.

regional reporter:
Jane Bassett
PRCC, Bishop Museum
P. 0. Box 19000-A
Honolulu, Hl 96817 808/848-4113

Greater Los Angeles & Santa Barbara

Miguel Angel Corzo has been appointed director of the Getty Conservation Institute (GCI), succeeding Luis Monreal, who resigned in March, 1990. As head of the Friends of the Arts of Mexico Foundation, Corzo organized "Mexico: Splendors of Thirty Centuries," currently at the Met in New York. He has worked for GCI previously, as a consultant and then as director of special projects, between 1985 and '87.

Katy Untch completed her one year internship in antiquities conservation at the Getty in September and is now doing a post-graduate internship at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.

Emily Dunn began a one-year internship in antiquities conservation at the Getty. She is a graduate of the NYU Conservation Center program. She spent last year at the British Museum in the Ceramics and Glass Section and in the Organics Section.

Loretta Hogan, Conservator of Ceramics and Glass at the British Museum, spent the month of November in Antiquities Conservation at the Getty learning the techniques used in vase conservation.

The Antiquities Conservation Department at the Getty, in collaboration with the Education and Antiquities Curatorial Departments, will open an "Interactive Gallery" which will explain to the public the role that the department plays in the museum. The gallery will include displays that highlight scientific investigations, treatment of stone, bronze and ceramic objects, environmental concerns and earthquake mitigation techniques.

Kelly Kamborian is currently working part time with Glenn Wharton & Associates in preparation for a career in conservation. Kelly is a Ph.D. candidate in Classical Archaeology at Brown University. She has previously interned at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston.

Scott Blair, owner of Conservation Support Systems (CSS) in Santa Barbara, is currently expanding his product line to include all aspects of conservation products and materials, from brushes to ultraviolet lights. CSS has designed, and is presently designing, innovative art support systems. In addition to traditional stretcher bars, CSS is currently developing an aluminum tubing based support system that has a concealed, variable tension, spring-loaded, bi-directional adjuster.

Janet Bridgland has left the GCI to relocate in Minnesota. As Program Officer to the Institute's Director, Janet was responsible for developing GCI policy and programs in the areas of Special Projects and Publications. As Documentation Program Director since 1986, Janet oversaw the Conservation Information Network, Art and Archaeology Technical Abstracts (AATA), and the GCI Library.

While Janet will be greatly missed, the GCI is fortunate that Kathleen McDonnell, Manager of the Conservation Information Network, brings her valuable experience and skills to the temporary position of Acting Program Director.

Barbara Snyder, Microsystems Coordinator in the Documentation Program, has left the Getty Conservation Institute to attend graduate school in art history at New York University. After almost four years at the Getty Conservation Institute, Michael Jaffe, Assistant Coordinator in the Data Management Section of the Documentation Program, has resigned to attend graduate school in urban planning at San Luis Obispo. Michael was responsible for the maintenance of both the Materials and Suppliers Databases of the Conservation Information Network, and as part of the WAAC Resources Committee, Michael helped update the new edition of the WAAC Resource File.

Romanian conservator Simona Pedrescu from the National Museum of Art in Bucharest will be arriving at the Getty Museum November 15 to work for about 6 months restoring four paintings which were damaged during the events of December 1989.

Camilla Van Vooren has recently completed her graduate studies at the University of Delaware/Wintherthur Museum Art Conservation Program. She will be stying at the Getty Museum for a second year-long internship in the Paintings Conservation Department.

Claire Dean has been appointed to the post of Archaeological Field Conservator for the Department of Anthropology at the University of North Dakota in Grand Forks. She will continue to live in the Los Angeles area, covering the department's excavations all over the west and midwest from her home base.

James Landry, an associate professor at Loyola Marymont University, is a senior fellow at the GCI on sabbatical. He is looking at the analysis of volatile organic compounds given off by display and storage case materials. He has, in conjunction with Michele Derrick and Dusan Stulik, developed a course conducted both at GCI and LMU in January 1991 on the Methods in Scientific Examination of Works of Art: Infra Microspectroscopy.

Tatyana M. Thompson attended the two-week "Workshop on New Methods in the Cleaning of Paintings" given by Richard Wolbers in August at the Getty Conservation Institute.

In October, Cara Varnell began a part-time six-month contract at LACMA as the Assistant Textile Conservator. Cara also continues to work privately from her studio in Long Beach, California.

Meredith Montague began a twelve-month internship in Textile Conservation at LACMA in September 1990 as part of her requirements for an M.A. with a certificate in Art Conservation from the Buffalo State College. A native of Texas, Meredith is happy to be back in the warmth and sunshine of the West.

The most recent staff addition in the Objects Conservation Lab at LACMA is Cate Harley. Beginning a one-year Getty Fellowship in September, Cate comes to the U.S. from Australia where she received her B.S. in the Conservation of Materials from Canberra College of Advanced Education.

On a one-year IMS Fellowship, Susan Sayer Batton is now working in LACMA's Paper Conservation Lab. Beginning in September, Susan began a survey of the Museum's Tibetan thangka collection. From 1985-90, Susan was the Head of Treatments at the Princeton University Library.

Eileen Sadoff is working part time with the Sculpture Conservation Studio in Santa Monica as a Conservation Assistant. In addition, Eileen is working part time for LACMA in Objects Conservation.

For the next six months, Claudia Rubin is working full time at the Fowler Museum of Cultural History at UCLA. She is part of a six-person team that is responsible for moving the museum's 150,000 artifacts from Haines Hall into their new building.

Robin Chamberlin, Conservator at the Fowler Museum of Cultural History, reports that the move of the museum's collection began this past October. A computer-assisted inventory is also being conducted and, with the support of an IMS Grant, a condition survey is underway.

Having left her position as Assistant Objects Conservator at LACMA, Sharon Blank has become the first conservator at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County. Working for the History Division, she can be reached at 213/744-6911. She is keeping very busy beginning with a holistic approach to the collections including pest management, light-level monitoring and storage assessment.

Teresa Knutson has completed a one-year Mellon Fellowship at LACMA in Textile Conservation. Her internship ended spectacularly with the reconstruction of a 17th century Italian court dress. Next, she will be working at the Minnesota History Center in St. Paul.

Sharon Shore, of Caring for Textiles, conserved a group of Japanese textiles for an exhibit at the Phoenix Art Museum, "Japanese Textiles from the Frank Lloyd Wright Archives."

regional reporters:
Catherine McLean
Conservation Center, LACMA
5905 Wilshire Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA 90036 213/857-6169

and

Glenn Wharton
549 Hot Springs Road
Santa Barbara, CA 93108 805/565-3639

Texas

The Texas Memorial Museum has been awarded a Conservation Project Support grant of $21,647 from the Institute of Museum Services to conduct a full conservation survey. A team of consulting American and Canadian museum specialists will be working in conjunction with TMM conservators Marilyn Lenz and Sally Shelton in assessing the condition of approximately 4.5 million items in the collection.

Holly Krueger is back at work after seven months of maternity leave, and starting a technical research project with the Amon Carter Museum's curator of prints and drawings on the work of Arthur Dove.

Carol Mancusi-Ungaro presented a paper at the IIC conference in Brussels in September.

Sara McElroy gave a presentation on conservation and participated in a panel discussion at the alumni career symposium in October at Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio.

Catherine Rogers has left Perry Huston & Associates, and has been working during October and November at McKay Lodge Fine Arts Conservation Laboratory.

Perry Huston & Associates held a seminar in November for preparators from small museums in north-central Texas and is planning for the removal and treatment of the Cincinnati Art Museum's Saul Steinburg mural.

Carlos Pacheco, a visiting conservator from the National Archives in San Jose, Costa Rica is working as an intern in the conservation labs at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center during October, November and December.

Karen Pavelka will be spending January, February and March as an intern at the Folger Shakespeare Library working with Frank Mowery.

regional reporter:
Mark van Gelder
Conservation Department
Huntington Art Gallery
University of Texas
23rd & San Jacinto
Austin, TX 78712 512/471-9204

San Diego

Fred Wallace has begun a year-long academic internship in the Paintings Department of the Balboa Art Conservation Center (BACC). Fred is student from the Art Conservation Department at the State University College at Buffalo.

Cecile Mear, paper conservator at BACC, recently attended the Enzyme Treatments conference at MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In September, Cecile graduated from the State University College at Buffalo training program.

The Paper Department at BACC hosted an evening- long meeting on the San Diego Print and Drawing Club presenting an overview of the care of works on paper.

regional reporter:
Marc Harnly
BAAC
P. 0. Box 3755
San Diego, CA 92103 619/236-9702

Rocky Mountain Region

The Rocky Mountain Regional Conservation Center (RMRCC) has welcomed three new staff members: Judy Greenfield, Associate Objects Conservator, joined the Center in January; Janet Hill, textiles technician, arrived in August; followed month later by Lori Mellon, RMRCC Director.

Randy Ash, Head of Paintings Conservation at the RMRCC, attended the 13th International Conservation Congress in Brussels this September and will visit Venezuela in October on a USIA grant to lecture on paintings conservation.

The entire state of Wyoming, it seems, was surveyed this May by conservators Terry Schindel and Gina Laurin, who conducted IMS-funded environmental facility surveys for a number of museums and historical sites.

Christine Sambrook, a textiles conservator at Hampton Court, has completed a year-long internship at RMRCC sponsored by NEA and will soon return to her work in the United Kingdom.

RMRCC was chosen to participate in a Smithsonian/Fulbright Central American Training Partnership. RMRCC conservators have enjoyed the month-long collaboration with anthropologist and OAS administrator Rafael Rivera of Panama City, Panama and conservator Raul Aguilar Jimenez of San Jose, Costa Rica.

Former RMRCC pre-program intern Rhonda Wozniak has begun graduate work this fall at Buffalo State College Art Conservation Program.

Jeanne Brako, Art Conservation Services of Colorado, presented a paper at the International Conference on Oriental Rugs held November in San Francisco on her treatment of six Anatolian rugs from the Ballard Collection, a conservation project for the St. Louis Art Museum. Brako, along with Robert McCarroll and Carmen Bria from the Western Center for the Conservation of Fine Arts (WCCFA), surveyed the Koshare Museum collections and facility in La Junta, Colorado.

Robert McCarroll, WCCFA Chief Paper Conservator, also performed two CAP surveys this fall: North Platte Valley Historical Association, Gering, Neb. and Meadows Museum of Art, Centenary University, Shreveport, LA.

David Bauer, WCCFA Associate Paintings Conservator, performed private surveys for Indiana State Museum and U.S. Air Force Academy this fall. Bauer lectured on art conservation following an IMS survey of the Sangre de Cristo Arts & Conference Center, Pueblo, Colorado. He also participated as adjunct faculty for the team-taught course "Coloquium on Connoisseurship" at the Denver Art Museum; his presentation focused on cleaning of paintings as related to connoisseurship issues.

Carmen F. Bria, WCCFA Chief Paintings Conservator, delivered a day-long seminar on conservation of fine art at the wildlife of the American West Art Museum, Jackson, Wyoming.

The Denver Art Museum held a two-day staff training workshop on "Preventive Care and Maintenance of Collections." Project Director Debra Ashe, the museum's associate registrar, involved conservators Jeanne Brako, speaking on textiles; Charles Patterson, pest management and objects; Robert McCarroll, paper; and Randy Ash, paintings.

Kay Karol Horse Capture, Objects Conservator at the Buffalo Bill Historical Center, Cody, Wyoming, gave a presentation on "Conservation Ethics with Native American Collections" at Mountain/Plains Museums Association pre-conference workshop held in Bozeman, Montana in October. BBHC was awarded a CAP grant for a building and collections assessment and assessments on two historic buildings.

Christine Young, formerly with the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, has opened a private practice in paper and photo conservation in Nashville, Tennessee. Cloe MacDonald, Photograph Librarian, Special Collections, U.S. G.S. Library, spoke at Colorado Preservation Alliance Annual Meeting on "Practical Paper Conservation: A No-Nonsense Guide to the Care and Handling of Books and Documents."

Charles Patterson, Denver Museum of Natural History, has covered the map this fall with IMS, CAP and private surveys in six states. While in Washington, Texas, Patterson presented a one-day workshop for area museum professionals on "Collections Care for Small Museums." At the September meeting of the Utah Preservation Guild held in Provo, Patterson presented : "Care of Collections: Three-dimensional Material", "Cons. and Management of Rock Art Sites" and "Volunteer Orientation to Natural History Collections." The Soc. for the Preservation of Natural History Collections has appointed Patterson to its documentation and conservation committees.

regional reporter:
Constance K. Mohrman
WCCFA
1225 Santa Fe Drive
Denver, CO 80204 303/573-1973

San Francisco Bay Area

The Oakland Museum has been awarded an IMS Conservation Grant which will include such activities as the upgrading of painting storage in the Art Department, identification of photographs in the History Department and earthquake mitigation museum-wide. John Burke is the director of the grant and Therese O'Gorman is the project coordinator. Jim Bernstein will be the consulting conservator for the painting project and Debbie Hess Norris will come in January to consult on photo and negative identification, and recommended improvements in the photo collection storage. John and Therese are also developing a long-range conservation plan for the museum. In the objects lab.

Mechelle Appel is the new pre-conservation school intern who will be working on ethnographic objects.

Elisabeth Cornu attended a meeting in September at the Smithsonian to discuss their "Fellowships for Professional Development in Conservation and Collection Care Program."

Tracy Power is away in Philadelphia completing a project on metal corrosion with Andrew Lins.

Glenn Wharton and Lesley Bone gave a presentation in October to the Western Museums Conference on disaster planning.

In the textile lab Leslie Melville Smith and Sarah Gates have just completed a three-year project conserving about 100 pre-19th century Anatolian Kilims from the Caroline & H. McCoy Jones Collection.

A major exhibition of Tibetan Art, "Wisdom and Compassion: The Sacred Arts of Tibet", consisting of 160 objects from 21 lenders, will be at the Asian Art Museum from April 17 to August 19, 1991. This exhibit, which will travel, is keeping the conservation staff very busy.

The Asian Art Museum and Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco conducted an earthquake drill in November which was observed by museum professionals from other institutions. This was conducted after an intense staff effort was made to write a new Emergency Response Procedure.

Linda Scheifler will speak to the Golden Gate Collectors in San Francisco in January discussing the preservation of private collections: what they can and shouldn't do!

Joan Wright continues her examination of the Indian miniature collection. In August, she assisted Ephraim Jose, mounter of Asian paintings, in mounting the Wang Yani painting, "Visit to the San Francisco Zoo". Faith Bilyeu, Conservation Technician, has just completed the onerous task of inventorying and labeling all hazardous materials in the conservation department in compliance with California state law.

regional reporter:
Therese O'Gorman
Oakland Museum
History Department
1000 Oak Street
Oakland, CA 94607 415/273-3806

Pacific Northwest

Wayne Haak chief mount-maker at the Getty Museum, recently spent two days at the Seattle Art Museum instructing Jack Mackey and Julie Creahan in seismic-conscious mounts for objects in the antiquities and ethnographic collections.

Jerry Podany of the Getty Museum Antiquities Conservation laboratory has completed consultation on installation of two seven-ton Chinese sculptures requiring seismic-restraint mounting in the new Seattle Art Museum.

Barbara Roberts is nearing completion of a vast condition survey for the New York Historical Society. She will be in Seattle during December.

Sandra Troon has recently completed work on a group of Islamic textiles to be shown in an exhibition of Islamic decorative arts scheduled for December at the Portland Art Museum.

regional reporter:
Patricia Tuttle-Leavengood
Art Conservation Services
215 2nd Avenue South
Seattle, WA 98104 206/587-3725

New Mexico & Arizona

Claire Munzenrider attended an international conference, "Adobe '90," held in Las Cruces, New Mexico.

Martha Little was co-instructor at an advanced conversation workshop on 19th century publishers' cloth bindings. It was held at the University of Iowa Center for the Book in November.

Landis Smith completed conservation for a number of the archaeological objects in the Maxwell Museum of Anthropology's new Hall of Southwest Peoples which opened November 12.

Laraine Daly Jones, of the Arizona Historical Society, is currently working on the laboratory chemical hygiene handbook for her institution, as required by OSHA regulations.

Jim Roberts, of the National Park Service-Western Archaeological Conservation Center, reports that his manual NPS/WACC Computer Software: SURVEY and MINISURV is now ready.

Nancy Odegaard has been working on several archaeological field projects, most notably at the Roosevelt Lake excavations run by Arizona State University in the Tonto Basin of Arizona where prehistoric basketry, basketry impressions, a painted staff, and other perishable materials are being discovered. She also has been advising at a turn-of-the-century Pima site in central Arizona.

regional reporters:
Landis Smith
Museum of New Mexico
208 Gonzales Road
Santa Fe, NM 87504 505/989-9379

and

Nancy Odegaard
Arizona State Museum
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85721 602/621-6314