​WUDPAC alumni are among those using a blend of remote monitoring and on-site tours to safeguard collections while museums are closed. From a May 25, 2020 article by Nancy Kenney for The Art Newspaper:
When museums across the United States abruptly closed their doors in mid-March in response to the coronavirus pandemic, chief conservators faced a challenge: how to assure the well-being of their collections without the benefit of constant physical oversight.
What most have come up with is a heavy reliance on on-site engineers and climate technology—from remotely monitored HVAC systems to digital data loggers to old-fashioned analogue hygrothermographs—supplemented by detailed periodic walk-throughs by designated conservators. And they are reporting that their collections remain safe in their environmentally controlled galleries, storage rooms and conservation labs.
At the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York, the paintings conservator Michael Duffy logs about five miles during each of his twice-weekly visits, according to Kate Lewis, the museum’s chief conservator. With the galleries darkened except for a low level of emergency lighting, he inspects the art with a flashlight to verify that there has been no intrusion of water, infestation by pests or other worrisome change.
One of the most striking observations by conservators is the remarkably low level of dust they are finding in the galleries. “The greatest sources of dust are the fibres, skin cells and hairs coming off the visitors, so now that’s far less urgent,” says Francesca Casadio, executive director of conservation and science of the Art Institute of Chicago.
Claire Taggart, conservator at the Nasher Sculpture Center in Dallas, said she stopped by the museum to check on works after it had been closed for six weeks. “It was like only a weekend had gone by in terms of dust,” she said in wonder. “I liken it to a resting time for the art.”
Many conservators moved to cover the most light-sensitive works after their museums closed their doors. Casadio’s team, for example, placed glassine and brown paper over drawings, prints, photographs and textiles as well as some light-sensitive canvases in the exhibition El Greco: Ambition and Defiance. (Originally scheduled to run from 7 March to 21 June, the show has been tentatively extended to the autumn because of the museum’s indefinite closure.) And Matthew Siegal, chair of conservation and collections management at the Museum of Fine Arts (MFA), Boston, said that conservators had draped polyethylene over dust-sensitive polychrome painted wood and stone statues and sealed dress mannequins in polyethylene bags....
All of the conservators interviewed said they were relying heavily on engineers in facilities operations and building systems departments to monitor climatic conditions in their museums around the clock on computers receiving data from sensors built into HVAC systems. At institutions including the Museum of Fine Arts (MFA), Boston and the Cleveland Museum of Art, the HVAC systems are supplemented by strategically placed digital data loggers from which information can be extracted by conservators and then examined remotely by colleagues. ...
But the biggest interruption at the Cleveland museum was the halt to its highest-profile project, the treatment of its sandstone Cambodian statue Krishna Lifting Mount Govardhan from around AD600. Conservators had taken apart the previous reconstruction of the statue and cleaned it and were removing iron stains through a complicated process involving a gel poultice. The statue was to be the centrepiece of an exhibition opening on 18 October, but now [Sarah] Scaturro[, chief conservator at the museum] does not expect the show to open for at least another year. “Right now everything is in flux because we don’t know when we will reopen,” she said. ...
Unable to enter the museum to continue treatment projects, conservators have been catching up on researching and writing academic papers, processing digital images of works of art, writing and editing condition and treatment reports, supplementing conservation information in their digital management systems, enrolling in online workshops and conferences, and sharing their experiences with colleagues at other museums via online chats, social media and phone calls. Like countless other museum staff members, they have marvelled at what they have been able to achieve by working remotely but have chafed at the limitations as well. “Research and writing is something the conservators never have time for, and being able to devote some time to it is a silver lining,” Siegal says. “But they’re all chomping at the bit. Everyone’s very anxious to get back to work” at the MFA.
To read the full article and learn about conservation acitivites happening at museums around the country, visit The Art Newspaper website here.
