Some of the world’s finest oil paintings have been self-destructing, developing mysterious lumps and bumps known as ‘art acne’.
Works by Georgia O’Keeffe and Rembrandt are among the hundreds of works blighted by the condition.
For decades, art conservators have struggled to control the outbreaks, which look like grains of sand to the naked eye.
But now, a team at Northwestern University in Chicago has developed an iPad software that can zoom in on the pigments closer than ever before, revealing the chemical issue at hand.
In 20 seconds, the technology can scan a painting to produce a three-dimensional image of it.
Zooming in on ‘diseased’ paintings by Georgia O’Keeffe, the team found the bumps were ‘metal soaps’ caused by the oil paint’s pigments and ions combusting.
Researchers and museum directors say the device could prevent legions of art from fading into oblivion by allowing conservators to diagnose the problem earlier.
Northwestern University professor Oliver Cossairt gathers the surface metrology of Georgia O’Keeffe’s ‘Ritz Tower’ painting with his hand-held device
This is an up-close look at a detailed section of ‘Pedernal’ shows micron-sized protrusions from metal soaps. Georgia O’Keeffe. Pedernal, 1941. Oil on canvas, 19 x 30 1/4 inches. Georgia O’Keeffe Museum. Gift of The Georgia O’Keeffe Foundation. © Georgia O’Keeffe Museum
‘The free fatty acids within the paint’s binding media are reacting with lead and zinc pigments,’ said Marc Walton, a research professor of materials science and engineering in Northwestern’s McCormick School of Engineering, who co-led the study.
‘These metal soaps started to aggregate, push the surface of the painting up and form something that looks like acne.’
‘If we can easily measure, characterize and document these soap protrusions over and over again with little cost to the museum, then we can watch them as they develop,’ said Oliver Cossairt, an associate professor of computer science in McCormick, who led the technology development.
‘That could help conservators diagnose the health and prescribe treatment possibilities for damaged works of art.’
COMPUTER SCIENTISTS ARE BEING CONTRACTED BY MUSEUMS TO REMAKE OLD SOFTWARE AND HARDWARE TO PRESERVE DIGITAL ART
Another team is working to recreate software and hardware to restore computer-based art made in the 70s, 80s, 90s and even 2000s, which were made on now-defunct operating systems.
Dr Deena Engel, of NYU’s Department of Computer Science, is spearheading conservation projects at the Guggenheim, the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA), and partnering with teams in the Netherlands.
‘Works of software-based art and computer-based art are extremely fragile due to changes in operating systems, color space and more, which impact what you see in a work of art,’ Dr Engel said.
‘Think of a Word document that you wrote years ago. You may not be able to access the media to open it.
‘With art, if you can’t even get Java to run at all, that’s a huge problem.’
If the codes for black and white change, it can drastically change all of the colors in the piece, which could impact the effect the artist was aiming for.
Dr Engel works to source the original source code, adjust color codes, and preserve old languages that will be necessary to keep exhibiting these works.
More complex: in some cases, her team sources and reconstructs external hardware that remind computers how to act in the way they used to.
‘What we want to achieve is to experience the artist’s vision, to see the artwork as it was then. ‘But if it doesn’t run on current hardware, current operating systems, or cannot be reset with current program languages, it needs to be treated in order to be exhibited.’
Looking ahead, Dr Engel is also advising museums on how to work with artists to minimize these issues in the future.
There is no way to perfectly preserve computer art, she says, but there are things we can do to better protect it.
First, she says, museums should require that artists provide the source code with their artwork – something that is not done routinely.
Second, she says, artists should provide detailed instruction of which elements are most important and provide insight into the philosophy behind their aesthetic decisions.
Best would be a recording of the artwork, with them speaking over it ‘as it unfolds’ so that ‘there is a record of how it behaves and functions and what it looks like in its native environment, with the artist’s wishes.’
‘If in 20 years the color space is different, the museum would have a recording of the artist saying ‘these areas are very important’ so that the variability that will definitely occur will be able to be understood. Future conservators will be able to make decisions based on the artist’s wishes.’
