This pair of oil on canvas paintings has brittle canvas that had been repaired in a rush.
Lets look into the problems they had, in the following pictures:

These torn canvases were repaired with patches of canvas from back, which were in turn stuck to a wooden board backing. At one place in one of the two canvases, a very rough stitching attempt has been made to keep the broken canvas in place!

What i understand after observing many paintings in our lab is that the wood(wooden board) stuck to the canvas back accelerates the acidification/ageing of the canvas and hence the brittleness. We carefully removed the wooden back from both the paintings.

There was a lot of work to be done patiently and time was limited…
(to be continued…)

Part 2

After careful cleaning, removing the board from back, providing a conservation grade linen canvas backing, and in-painting,  the results were as visible in the following picture: