May 2002 Volume 22 Number 2

Regional News

Arizona

Martha Grimm is currently working on a collection of couture for the Phoenix Art Museum’s upcoming exhibition Garden of Eden. The exhibit includes 90 mannequins and will be the largest collection of this kind ever displayed in Arizona.

Linda Morris is working on a number of projects, including a collection of letters from Buffalo National River in Arkansas.

Gretchen Voeks continues working on plans for the new Western Archeological and Conservation Center and the movement of collections to this building. Construction has begun, with a completion date scheduled for early 2003.

Brynn Bender continues conservation treatment and storage upgrades for a collection of 290 kachina dolls. Assisting her is student Audrey Harrison. Brynn is currently working at the Western Archeological and Conservation Center through a co-operative agreement with the University of Arizona. She will fill the position of Assistant Conservator with the National Park Service in May.

Nanette Skov is planning for her June trip to Arequipa, Peru. She will hold a textile workshop at the Universidad de San Agustin Museo.

Marilen Pool has completed her contract project investigating pesticide use history for the National Museum of the American Indian. She has since returned to her private practice in Tucson. This spring she will be working as a consultant for Tucson’s Tohono Chul Park.

Nancy Odegaard recently completed a shape recovery and stabilization project for a large collection of ancient moccasins at the University of Utah.

Regional Reporter:

Hawaii

Laura Gorman has set up a studio and begun doing treatments on individual objects at the estate of Doris Duke. The house, Shangri-la, will be opened to the public at the end of October, 2002. Laura also recently examined the bed springs belonging to Queen Lili’uokalani at her last residence, Washington Place, where her bedroom is being restored for public exhibit.

Gregory Thomas’ most recent projects in his private practice, Art Care, include an egg tempera on panel by Peter Hurd and a lithograph by Paul Emmert. The painting is from a series of Hawaiian landscape paintings, circa 1949, and the print is from a series of images of mid-19th-century Honolulu. Also recently treated by Greg was the mural by Pegge Hopper at the Honolulu Community College. Undergoing treatment are several paintings of Kilauea volcano by D. Howard Hitchcock from the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park and paintings from the State Foundation on Culture and the arts in preparation for exhibition in the new Hawaii State Museum to open later this year.

Larry and Rie Pace of Pace Art Conservation Enterprises have been busy on numerous projects including the treatment of a large oil by Alexandra Nikita, an 18th-century triptych of the Judgement of Christ, the cleaning of a public mural by Robert Lee Eskridge, and the treatment of a 17’ long mural on canvas by Jean Charlot. They are in the process of treating two paintings belonging to the State Foundation on Culture and the Arts, which by some incredible coincidence are going to be exhibited in the new Hawaii State Museum to open later this year. Rie will be giving a slide lecture open to the general public on the conservation of oil paintings. The lecture will take place at the Koichi Museum of Art on Shikoku, Japan.

Regional Reporter:

New Mexico

Martha Little has received an FAIC Professional Development Scholarship

to attend Anthony Cains’ workshop course on Conservation Techniques August 5-9, 2002 in Montefiascone, Italy. The course will be based on some of the innovative techniques Cains developed while working at Trinity College Dublin and over his long career. Cains served from 1967- 1972 as Technical Director of the conservation system set up in the Biblioteca Nationale Centrale in Florence after the 1966 flood. In 1972 he established the laboratory in the Library of Trinity College Dublin. He has contributed articles to The Paper Conservator and New Bookbinder and taught and lectured in Ireland and the UK, Europe, the USA, and Australia.

David Rasch, collections conservator for the Museum of Spanish Colonial Arts and consultant, has been assisting Kathryn Klein of the Maxwell Museum at the University of New Mexico in redesigning the ethnography storage facility at the museum. This project was occasioned by the removal of the Maxwell’s archaeological collections to the new Hibben Archaeological Center, which is being built next door to the Maxwell Museum on the UNM campus.

Laura Downey is settling into her job as the conservator for the University Art Museum at the University of New Mexico by working on moving the museum’s collections to an off-site location while the HVAC system for the museum is upgraded.

Susan Barger is the Project Coordinator for a joint project between the New Mexico Association of Museums and the Museum of New Mexico to improve museum infrastructure in New Mexico and to enhance the ability of small museums around the state to receive traveling exhibits. She is working directly with six museums all around the state of New Mexico, organizing workshops with others in the Museum of New Mexico system, bringing in consultants, and working on improvements to the NMAM

website and organizing a listserv for NMAM. A Leadership Grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services funds the program. She and Laura Downey are also co-teaching a course at the University of New Mexico on the “Materials Science of 2-D Art Materials.” In addition, Barger is also teaching part of the UNM School of Architecture and Planning’s course in Historic Preservation along with Dennis Playdon of Cornerstones.

Claire Munzenrider, Director of Conservation for the Museum of New Mexico, is concentrating on monitoring the museum’s energy use to improve the environments for collections while also saving money.

Mina Thompson is the lead conservator for a large exhibit on Spanish and Mexican Maiolica, which is scheduled to open in Mid-November, 2002. Larry Humetewa is assisting Mina in the treatments. He is also continuing his work to research and treat Mexican lacquerware from Michoacan and Guerrero.

Teresa Myers is completing her 3rd year internship in the Buffalo State College Art Conservation Department through her position as an intern in the Conservation Department. She is assisting on Maiolica exhibition and other treatments. She is also conducting research on atlatls (spear throwers) for the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture/Laboratory of Anthropology. She will remain in the Museum’s Conservation lab after graduation from Buffalo for a one-year contract position as Assistant Conservator.

The Conservation Unit is happy to announce that Emily O’Brien will begin her third-year internship for the Buffalo Art Conservation Program in Fall, 2002.

Melanie Gifford, Research Associate at the National Gallery, just completed a three-day intensive workshop on polarized light microscopy for the Museum of New Mexico Conservation Unit. The Conservation Unit is also looking forward to a visit from Steven Weintraub the end of March.

Regional Reporter:

Pacific Northwest

Jack Thompson of Thompson Conservation Lab conducted three CAP surveys in the latter part of 2001. The son of a client who dropped off a 40” X 90” pastel portrait in 1989 is beginning to seriously consider the possibility of eventually having some work done. No word yet about who will pay the storage fee.

The Caber Press (a subsidiary of TCL) published the following books: Church Chests of the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries by Philip M. Johnston (originally published in 1907); Food Products of the North American Indians by Dr. Edward Palmer (1870); Iron & Steel: Forging - Hardening – Tempering by C. Holtzapffel (1843); Leather Work by Georges de Recy (1905); The Art & Science of Gilding by Ford & Mimmack (1909); Working Horn, Ivory & Tortoiseshell by C. Holtzapffel (1843); Mediæval Bookbinding by M. Mauris (originally published in 1878).

At the Mill of Dunnydeer the three-inch pipe has been dug up to be replaced with six-inch pipe; test runs of clay show promise for an eventual Dunnydeer Pottery; the wattle and daub test patch at the first Dunnydeer hovel has survived two winters. This may be the year to put a roof on....

WAAC President, J. Claire Dean, and Secretary, Hiawatha Johnston, are frantically pulling things together for the October meeting in Portland and in the process are having fun. In December Claire was sent to the bottom of a salt mine in Hutchinson, Kansas, on behalf of the local historical society to carry out a general study of the feasibility of establishing a museum and curatorial facility 650 feet underground. Since then she has stayed fairly close to home, hearth, and dog. In April she will be going home to the UK for a holiday and a chance to visit the new British Museum expansions and the Tate Modern.

Sandra Troon is moving the Oregon Textile Workshop. The new address is: 9745 SW 163rd Avenue, Beaverton, OR 97007. New number for phone and fax: 503-521-0719. Email will still be stroon@effectnet.com. The new address is effective beginning March 29, 2002.

Scott Carroll and Ellen Roblee (who were married last fall) have changed their names to Scott and Ellen Carrlee. They can still be reached at their respective job sites, the Alaska State Museum and the Juneau Douglas City Museum. Ellen has been busy this spring with many new exhibits and incoming collections. Scott has been to Haines to help with a collections move at the Sheldon Museum and to Anchorage to teach the conservation section of the Property Management Course put on by the Department of the Interior.

Monica Shah continues her work at the Alaska Regional Curatorial Center and also does private work that takes her to different regions of the state.

Regional Reporter:

Rocky Mountain Region

Carl Patterson and Jessica Fletcher at the Denver Art Museum have been busy planning work areas for the new museum building that will open in 2005. Carl is on the board of the Colorado/Wyoming Museum Association and Mountain Plains Museum Association. Congratulations to Jessica and husband Jay on the March 28th birth of daughter Fiona Fletcher Shore. Judy Greenfield will be filling in at the DAM for Jessica while she is on maternity leave.

Jude Southward and Matt Crawford of the Denver Museum of Nature and Science are both teaching this semester. Jude is teaching “Introductions to Collections Preservation Within Museums” at University of Colorado in Boulder, and Matt is teaching “Introduction to Conservation” at University of Denver. At the museum they are both working on projects related to the new Space Odyssey exhibit.

Jude will be presenting a paper at the Natural Science Collections Alliance meeting in Washington, DC on storage projects at DMNS designed to eliminate wood and other potentially harmful materials from the storage environment.

Barbara Johnson has been treating public sculpture in Vail, Colorado including a Claes Oldenburg maquette and an outdoor bronze sculpture of a 10th Mountain Division Ski Trooper. The trooper was disfigured with deposits from the crowds of onlookers when the Olympic torch passed through Vail.

Regional Reporter:

San Francisco Bay Area

The Objects Conservation Laboratory staff at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco are now working out of the deYoung off-site facility and are preparing objects for traveling exhibitions from the museum’s collections.

Natasa Morovic, gilding conservator, is conserving period frames for paintings from the Rockefeller collection of American art, soon to go on tour.

Lesley Bone, ethnographic conservator, is readying a large number of African artifacts from the museums’ collection for an exhibit to Mexico City.

Elisabeth Cornu, objects conservator, is working with the San Francisco Airport Museums in the staging of two exhibitions from the Fine Arts Museums’ American collection: one of silver, one of chairs. Bonnie Baskin, contract conservator, is assisting with this project and is working at the San Francisco Airport Museum with other exhibit conservation tasks. Elisabeth Cornu also is the recipient of a Fulbright teaching grant and will soon be traveling to Argentina where she will teach two courses—Preventive Conservation and A Survey of Sculpture Conservation.

The Textile Conservation Lab of the Fine Arts Museums is up and running since the move from the de Young in Golden Gate Park to temporary quarters in South San Francisco. They have welcomed Beth Szuhay back to the lab. Beth was a pre-program intern in the 90’s and finished the Winterthur program last year. She joins Joanne Hackett, who is returning after a six month maternity leave (welcome Grace Elizabeth, born in December) and Sarah Gates, who has returned from six months of disability leave. Also working in the lab is a Scottish conservator, Elizabeth Anne Haldane, who is working on the conservation of an 18th-century robe a la française with matching petticoat. Elizabeth Anne is taking the dress back to its original form and in doing so has fabricated matching polychrome silk brocade to replace missing ruffles, flounce, and stomacher. They hope to have it on exhibition at the Legion of Honor within a year.

The talented and dedicated volunteer staff of six - some of whom have been with us for over twenty years - have made the move as well and are working on keeping up with storage upgrades and making safe housing for new acquisitions. Thanks to all of you that sent your good thoughts and best wishes during our move – the lab needed them!

In February, FAMSF paper conservator Janice Schopfer and paper conservation intern Michelle Facini traveled to the Getty Museum to consult with Nancy Turner about techniques for consolidation, repair, loss compensation, and housing of illuminated manuscripts.

Michelle Facini and FAMSF paper conservator Debra Evans conducted light bleaching of a Michael Heizer print measuring 4 X 7 ft. The light bleaching tank was made outside with two by fours atop a big Plexiglas sheet. Polyethylene formed the sink. Conservators in the future won’t have to wait for the Land’s End fog to lift. Janice Schopfer is constructing a new light bleaching system over the 5 X 7 ft. sink in the FAMSF paper lab.

In March, Michelle Facini went to the Boston Museum of Fine Arts and the Freer to continue her research on using a hand-held spectrophotometer to identify organic colorants in Japanese woodblock prints. In April, Debra Evans and James Bernstein led the first of the AIC’s “Master Studies” workshops, “Mastering Inpainting,” which was held at the new Oakland Museum conservation lab.

At the FAMSF Painting’s Lab the conservation of Frederic Church’s monumental painting Rainy Season in the Tropics was directed by Carl Grimm and completed in February by Carl, Tony Rockwell, and Charlotte Seifen. The painting is now on view at the Tate Gallery as part of American Sublime. It will be featured in an upcoming Fine Arts Magazine.

Tony, with assistance from Patricia O’Regan and the rest of the staff, recently treated a very large (almost 10 feet long!) portrait of the Stanford family by Thomas Hill for the Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University. We have all been busy preparing a large selection of the American paintings collection for the upcoming American Accents tour. We are pleased to announce that our pre-program intern Jo-Fan Huang has been granted interviews at both the Buffalo State College and the Winterthur/University of Delaware graduate programs in conservation. The demolition of the old deYoung Museum began this month. At present everything is on schedule with the new museum, designed by Herzog & deMeuron, set to open spring 2005.

Will Shank is working in April with Joe Fronek and the staff of LACMA on the conservation of a large color field painting, Dalet Heh by Morris Louis, with a generous grant from the Morris Louis Conservation Fund. Earlier this year he prepared several loan paintings by Yvonne Jacquette for the current exhibition, Aerial Muse at the Cantor Center for Visuals Arts, Stanford University.

Niccolo Caldararo, Director and Chief Conservator of Conservation Art Service, has been leading a project with Yolanda Chavez, an independent archaeology consultant to design and produce workshops for Native American tribes and museum workers on how to deal with pesticide contaminated artifacts. Niccolo has continued work with Pete Palmer on a program for the analysis of pesticides at S.F. State University.

Claire Antonetti and Niccolo have completed a number of projects in the last few months including the restoration of a large icon. The treatment of this icon was begun by Larry Majewski over a decade ago, but not completed. Anne Kahle, Claire, and Niccolo have been using a modified facing technique developed by Keiko Keyes on severely deteriorated moisture-sensitive works of art on paper, to remove backings and mount. One of the works treated was a beautiful watercolor by Moran. Candis Griggs and Niccolo have been preserving mold-damaged slides for the National Park Service and surveying the collections of the City of San Jose.

At the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco Donna Strahan continues to work with the New Asian project office to plan the new conservation laboratory. She is working very closely with the curators and designers for the new galleries as well as preparing and treating objects for the move. In April she will attend the BUMA (Beginnings of the Use of Metals and Alloys) meeting in Kyongju, Korea.

Mark Fenn continues trying to keep up with design and specification changes in the plans for the new building. He’s also been doing lots of Oddy testing of proposed construction materials and treating high priority objects for the move.

Jane Williams returned from a month practicing lacquer fabrication techniques and observing lacquer artists and restorers in Tokyo, Nara, and Kiso-Hirasawa, Japan. She is continuing to study and to treat lacquer objects in the museum’s collection.

Blanche Kim continues to examine and treat objects that are scheduled for exhibition when the New Asian opens, as well as helping in planning the new lab. She attended a portion of the recent IRUG conference at the Getty to learn about FTIR and Raman spectroscopy advances and instrumentation.

Setsuko Kawazu is working as a guest conservator with paper conservator Debra Fox. Setsuko comes from Handa’s studio in Tokyo where she has spent 5 years working in conservation of screens, scrolls, prints, and books. Setsuko and Debra are stabilizing a large Japanese Mandala for installation at the New Asian.

Meg Geiss-Mooney has been working closely with the registrars on re-housing portions of the collection before the move. Candis Griggs is overseeing several move-related projects including cover-sewing for lacquer furniture and screens. She is also working closely with the packers and registrars to determine safe packing methods.

Tonja King has been treating a variety of objects for installation in the new building. She is also working on a research project for the preservation of the Indonesian puppet collection.

Paula De Cristofaro and Alina Remba from the SFMOMA Paintings Conservation staff recently completed an on-site condition survey and treatment project of paintings by Hans Hofmann in the collection of the Berkeley Art Museum. Over twenty paintings by Hofmann from the BAM collection will be loaned to two American venues later on this year. Preventive treatments, including stretcher linings and consolidation of delicate paint layers, were carried out on these fragile works prior to their loan.

Regional Reporter:

Texas

Barbara Brown, photograph conservator at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at the University of Texas at Austin, will travel in June to the Getty Conservation Institute with Joseph Nicephore Niepce’s heliograph View from a Window at Le Gras (aka the World’s First Photograph) from the Ransom Center’s Gernsheim Collection.

She will work with Dusan Stulik and other GCI scientists and staff on a collaborative project to analyze the components of the heliograph and to have a new, oxygen-free display case made for it. Getty Museum conservators will undertake treatment of the heliograph’s gilt frame. The heliograph will go on display at the Harry Ransom Center when its new gallery opens in March 2003.

Jean Baldwin was hired recently as an Assistant Conservator III half-time in paper conservation at the Ransom Center. She continues with her private practice in book conservation and can be contacted at jbaldwinconservation@onebox.com.

Ellen Cunningham-Kruppa, instructor in The Graduate School of Library and Information Science’s Preservation and Conservation Studies program (University of Texas at Austin), received a grant from the John Anson Kittredge Educational Fund to sponsor two PCS conservation students, April Smith and Sarah Reidell. They will travel to France October 4-19, 2001, to intern in a private conservation lab and to visit libraries and archives in the south of France to observe and discuss preservation practices with French librarians and archivists.

The Michèle Rome Atelier in Arles, France, which focuses on the treatment of paper and books, hosted the two-week internship. The atelier is contracted by numerous libraries, archives, and museums in southern France for treatment of their collections. The students worked with Michèle Rome (owner/conservator) and Cedric Lelievre (conservator), performing conservation treatment on rare books from the Bibliothèque d’Histoire du Droit, which is part of the Université Montpellier system.

Ellen Cunningham-Kruppa, who was on leave with her family in France, supervised the internship and performed photo-documentation of treatments. Cedric Lelievre accompanied Ellen and the students on visits to the Archives départementales des Bouches-du-Rhone and La Fondation Saint-John Perse, both in Aix-en-Provence, the Bibliothèque d’Histoire du Droit in Montpellier, and the Institute d’Histoire du Livre in Lyons.

One of the goals of this short internship was to plant the seeds for expanded exchange between French and American preservation professionals. The GSLIS Preservation and Conservation Studies program and the Michèle Rome Atelier agree that the internship provided a firm foundation on which to build a close relationship and fruitful exchange.

Marlan Green, currently a PCS Preservation Administration student, and Karen Pavelka, Instructor in the PCS program, will be co-presenting at this years AIC meeting as part of the Electronic Media Group. They will discuss the changes that electronic information has brought to the PCS curriculum from the point of view of both student and teacher. In February, Karen spoke at the Fifth Biennial Historic Natchez Conference, “Mainstreams and Cross Currents: Interpreting the History of the Old Natchez District”.

Sarah Reidell and Nora Lockshin, third year PCS conservation students, will both present papers at this year’s ANAGPIC meeting held at Harvard University in April. Nora will be presenting the results of her research project and treatment of 20th-century private press book Schnitzelbank.

Internship sites for this year’s PCS conservation interns are : April Smith, Library of Congress, supervisor: Maria Nugent; Ann Lindsey, The Newberry Library, supervisor: Susan Rusick; Sarah Reidell, Harvard U. Libraries, supervisor: Pamela Spitzmueller; Nora Lockshin, American Museum of Natural History, supervisor: Barbara Rhodes; Sara Holmes, The Missouri State Archives, supervisor: Lisa Fox.

Richard Trela, at the Panhandle Plains Historical Museum in Canyon, Texas completed the treatment on an Albert Schmidt landscape from the PPHS collection for display in the residence of the United States ambassador to the Vatican as part of the “Art In Embassies Program.” He also completed a CAP project for the Metcalf Mus. near Cheyenne, Oklahoma.

Anne Zanikos treated numerous paintings from the collection of actor and comedian Cheech Marin during February. The exhibit titled Chicano Now opened at the San Antonio Museum of Art and will travel to several venues during 2002 and 2003. Most of the objects in the collection had never been viewed in a museum environment and presented all of the problems expected in readying a collection for travel and display.

Elizabeth Lunning has recently been appointed Chief Conservator of The Menil Collection. Paper conservator at the museum since 1990, Elizabeth became Acting Chief Conservator last year.

In preparation for their upcoming expansion, Art Restorations, Inc. in Dallas, is pleased to announce three additions to their staff: Jeff Pouzar, a wooden artifacts technician, Jim Young, horologist, and Michael van Enter, a senior objects conservator specializing in outdoor sculpture and metals.

Regional Reporter:

Greater Los Angeles / Santa Barbara

At LACMA, NYU conservation student Sandhya Jain will be joining the Paper conservation lab this summer as a Camilla Chandler Frost Intern. Sandhya will be assisting with the treatment of a large 14th-century Nepalese Thangka. She will also be working with Conservation Scientist Marco Leona to analyze the dyes/pigments used on the thangka.

This summer, LACMA will also be hosting one other Camilla Chandler Frost internship: Yadine Laroachette will be in Textiles Conservation for nine weeks beginning June 17th. Yadine, having just finished her first year at Winterthur, will be examining LACMA’s collection of Islamic textiles. The focus of her work will be weave structure and pattern analysis. Judy Dion will be in Paintings Conservation, beginning July 1st for eight weeks as an Ahmanson Summer Intern. Judy will be working on a variety of permanent collection projects.

LACMA will also be hosting Mellon Fellows this upcoming year. Lauren Chang will be working in Textiles Conservation, and we are thrilled that Soko Furuhata will be the Mellon Fellow with the paper conservation lab for 2002-2003. Elisabeth Schlegel will continue her Mellon internship for another year in Paintings Conservation, under the supervision of Joe Fronek. Elisabeth has been working on treatments related to modern and contemporary art, including a 1969 painting by Helen Lundeberg as well as paintings in the Bernard and Edith Lewin Collection of Mexican art.

Joe Fronek presented a lecture, “Courbet’s Technical Realism” at the Norton Simon Museum last April. The lecture focused on a comparison between Courbet’s techniques in Stream of the Puits-Noir at Ornan of 1868 and French Academic painting of the late 18th and first half of the 19th century.

In preparation for the new Rem Koolhas building being planned for LACMA, Victoria Blyth-Hill spent a few days in March in NYC with Deputy Director Nancy Thomas looking at the new MoMA Queens conservation facility, storage, and galleries. Victoria and Nancy also visited the labs at the Metropolitan (Paper Conservation and Objects Conservation) and the Morgan Library (new Thaw Paper Conservation Center). Everyone graciously shared their experiences in moving, designing, and building their facilities, especially Karl Buchberg, Marjorie Shelley, and Peggy Ellis. The Conservation Center at LACMA expects to be housed in temporary quarters for 2-3 years.

Patricia Measures has taken the position of Conservation Assistant at the UCLA Fowler Museum of Cultural History. Patricia graduated from the Collections Conservation and Management Program at Sir Sandford Fleming College in Canada. After completing an internship in the objects lab at the Minnesota Historical Society, she worked as a conservator at the Scugog Shores Museum in Port Perry. Before joining the Fowler, she was in the process of treating a variety of swords and archaeological objects in the Parks Canada collection. Patricia will be busy this coming summer with the treatment of ethnographic artifacts and textiles that are being prepared for exhibit in the Fowler galleries and abroad. She is looking forward to talking with other conservators in the area and to working with Jo Hill at further developing her skills as an objects conservator.

Duane Chartier of ConservArt Associates, Inc., gave a three hour lecture on the history, properties, and architectural uses of concrete to the USC graduate architecture class of Peyton Hall on April 4, 2002.

Roz Westmoreland attended an international symposium in Amsterdam held March 7-9. It was in conjunction with the exhibition Van Gogh and Gauguin:  The Studio of the South. Conservators reported on recent technical studies carried out on the work of both artists.

Sanchita Balachandran is completing a year of a graduate internship in the department of Antiquities Conservation at the J. Paul Getty Museum.

Sculpture Conservation Studio welcomes Catherine Hayes to their staff. She specializes in outdoor metal sculpture. Since joining the studio, she has been busy at work on several sculptures at the Heard Museum and two monumental size sculptures in San Diego. Rosa Lowinger and Christeen Taniguchi just returned from Cypress Lawn after conservation treatment of a marble mausoleum. Sculpture Conservation Studio’s intern Amanda Black is busy taking advanced chemistry to complete her requirements for graduate conservation programs while still working full time at the Studio.

Williams Art Conservation, Inc. is pleased to announce that Odile Madden joined the firm in November, 2001. She continues to participate as a consultant to the Laser Conservation Research Section under the direction of Meg Abraham at the LACMA. Donna Williams presented two papers at the “Conservation and Maintenance of Contem- porary Public Art” conference organized by the Cambridge Arts Council in Boston. She presented an overview of conservation practices at the Los Angeles MTA Metro Art Program, and she co-presented a paper with Leslie Rainer on the “Los Angeles Murals Assessment and Conservation Project” for the City of Los Angeles.

John Williams has been actively expanding the Exhibition Mount making practice. He recently completed a contract with the Getty Decorative Arts Department in preparation for the exhibition Devices of Wonder. John and Odile also worked on the exhibition Artist as Explorer: African Art from the Walt Disney-Tishman Collection at the National Geographic Society. Together they assessed the condition of objects to be exhibited, designed and fabricated display mounts, and supervised packing and shipping of the objects from Los Angeles to Washington D.C..

Recently, WAAC member and towers engineer for 42 years, Bud Goldstone, lead a tour of Watts Towers. Using videos and historic images, Bud presented his unique view of the past and present dangers to the ethical conservation of the Watts Towers of Simon Rodia. A city and state monument on the National Register, the works were named a National Historic Landmark in 1990, one of only three at the time. Almost immediately, the site was labeled as endangered. The danger to the steel-reinforced sculptures was, and is, caused by the materials and techniques of the artist. The most recent danger, lack of maintenance since 1994, was hopefully resolved in April 2001 by actions of Margie Reese, the new General Manager of the city Cultural Affairs Department.

The Northridge Earthquake caused $1,900,000 damage to the tall towers and walls and the repairs have just been completed under conservator Zuleyma C. Aguirre with her Cultural Affairs crew of part-time employees.

Carolyn Tallent spent a week at the Riverside Municipal Museum in March surveying their paintings collection. While there, she gave a lecture and held an afternoon clinic, sponsored by the Museum, for museum professionals and the public. The stress of on-site work was eased considerably by her stay at the Mission Inn, courtesy of the Museum. She highly recommends the Museum gift shop for their selection of original fruit crate labels.

Regional Reporter:

Virginia Rasmussen
Conservation Center
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
5905 Wilshire Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90036
(323) 857-6168
vlr@lacma.org