Category Archives: Painting Conservation

Some deteriogens are very nicely hidden

June 22, 2018

One of the miniature paintings we came across last month was showing some signs of biological degradation, but no active microbes were visible on the surface. This was unlike other miniature paintings of the same lot, which had visible mold on surface, specially at the back of the painting. This painting had no mold visible…

Brief record of miniature painting’s assessment and conservation

June 19, 2018

When a conservator gets art works like the above miniature painting, it is not just the damages that interest him/her, it is also the history/mythology and story depicted in the painting that attracts the conservator. Story/history/mythology apart from the technique and place in timeline/age, would scale the importance of the painting. We study a painting for…

Flaking in Miniature Paintings

June 10, 2018

Indian miniature paintings have various schools and technical differences, but most of them have thick paint layer and impasto effects. Thick paint layers tend to flake off under certain circumstances. This flaking can be very unstable/powdering off or more stable in the sense that flaking is not falling off easily… We at heritage preservation Atelier…

Rescuing Frescoes from ruins

May 31, 2018

At the edge of a jungle, we found some ruins of a temple which was still functional in adjoining more recently constructed room. Initially when i visited the site in 2008, there was another structure right in the middle of the temple complex. This structure was now (2015) totally erased from the landscape. Only a…

Painting, backing, conservation and Physics

May 16, 2018

Very often we have seen that old worn out paintings are pasted on thicker backing board or sheet. This initially looks good as the worn out or crushed paper or fabric looks much better as it acquires the smoothness and strength of the new backing; but, we tend to ignore that this is not for…

one little observation while studying old miniature paintings

May 11, 2018

At times we find old sticky tape which leaves almost no adhesive on paper and does not make the paper brittle; instead, it makes its own plastic base brittle. Is this because of the adhesive chemistry itself or because of the pigment on the paper it is applied on?