Overcoming Obstacles to Preventive Conservation Projects in Italy: With a Case Study of the Savoy Carriage Collection of the Presidency of the Republic

ABSTRACT

Working on preventive conservation in Italy is difficult but not impossible. After small successes and setbacks convincing museums to adopt elements of preventive conservation in the 1990s, the first author (Rossi Doria) was contracted for 15 years to preserve the historic carriages and associated objects of the Presidency of the Republic of Italy. This required patience to overcome or circumvent obstacles such as an inflexible bureaucracy and the absence of any formal recognition of preventive conservation within the educational and contractual systems for heritage conservation. The key factors in his success were the support of the curators, the financial and planning autonomy of the Presidency, and the obvious need for conservation and preservation of these elegant and complex objects. The program began in 2001 with the recovery of the forgotten collection from inappropriate storage in several locations. The entire collection was surveyed and recorded, not only the carriages but also thousands of harnesses, saddles, clothing, fabrics, weapons and memorabilia. Multiple preventive and interventive actions were undertaken, such as pest eradication for all sensitive materials, environmental surveys, and everyday maintenance, as well as complex treatments for the ornate carriages. Analysis by country of published articles on preventive conservation and of IIC membership both confirm that the topic is not as well established in Italy as in many other countries. Some reasons and solutions are proposed.     

渐江绘画艺术形式对安徽建筑景观设计的启迪

渐江曾生活于现今的安徽地域,对安徽的人文风貌在其画作中描绘了许多。渐江的绘画画风笔墨严谨、格调简约,对描绘的自然景物高度概括,虽然用墨偏淡,但不显虚空。画面形式具有现代设计学的韵味,构图独特。这种当时的新视觉形式,不仅影响了中国的山水画,而且也给安徽建筑景观设计在形式和意境方面带来了影响和启示。     

一类2×2拟线性双曲守恒律组的奇性形成

本文在文[3]的基础上,进一步给出了包含均熵气体动力学方程组在内的一类2×2拟线性双曲守恒律组的奇性形成结果,证明了在“真正大初值”条件下,Lax定理仍然成立。     

The Artist Initiative at San Francisco Museum of Modern Art

The Artist Initiative at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) is piloting models for increased collaboration between conservators and curators through joint work with artists. We seek a more integrated, holistic approach to the care and research of our collection. The project, funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, comprises five robust research engagements that serve the curatorial collecting departments of the museum (Photography, Painting and Sculpture, Media Art, and Architecture and Design). Three of the projects are monographic studies, examining the work of Ellsworth Kelly, Vija Celmins, and Julia Scher in depth, while two more are thematic, exploring modes of displaying digitally-driven design objects, and developing strategies for addressing the problem of color shift common to photographic prints made with experimental materials during the 1970s and 1980s. The Artist Initiative is also charged with developing hybrid working spaces to advance collaborative approaches to collections research at the museum's new downtown campus and at SFMOMA's new Collections Center in South San Francisco. These spaces include the Collections Workroom, a 56?sq?m (600?sq?ft) space that functions as a studio for visiting artists, a conservation laboratory, an interview suite, and a classroom at SFMOMA's downtown campus. At the Collections Center, a 121?sq?m (1300?sq?ft) Mock-Up Gallery has been built as a working model of one of the museum's new galleries. A functional exhibition space, the Mock-Up Gallery is also a venue for interviewing artists, prototyping exhibition formats, and meeting with students, scholars, museum staff, and community members. With the goal of contributing to critical discourses in contemporary art history, art conservation, and public engagement, each of the Artist Initiative projects includes a colloquium that will bring experts from multiple fields together with the featured artists. Thereafter we aim to share our findings widely through public programs and a range of publications, both digitally and in print.     

Technical analysis of a Central Asian wall painting detached from a Buddhist cave temple on the northern Silk Road

A great number of Central Asian wall paintings, archeological materials, architectural fragments, and textiles, as well as painting fragments on silk and paper, make up the so called Turfan Collection at the Asian Art Museum in Berlin. The largest part of the collection comes from the Kucha region, a very important cultural center in the third to ninth centuries. Between 1902 and 1914, four German expeditions traveled along the northern Silk Road. During these expeditions, wall paintings were detached from their original settings in Buddhist cave complexes. This paper reports a technical study of a wall painting, existing in eight fragments, from the Buddhist cave no. 40 (Ritterhöhle). Its original painted surface is soot blackened and largely illegible. Grünwedel, leader of the first and third expeditions, described the almost complete destruction of the rediscovered temple complex and evidence of fire damage. The aim of this case study is to identify the materials used for the wall paintings. Furthermore, soot deposits as well as materials from conservation interventions were of interest. Non-invasive analyses were preferred but a limited number of samples were taken to provide more precise information on the painting technique. By employing optical and scanning electron microscopy, energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy, micro X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction analysis, and Raman spectroscopy, a layer sequence of earthen render, a ground layer made of gypsum, and a paint layer containing a variety of inorganic pigments were identified.     

Effective preservation decision strategies

Decisions about preservation issues are made both deliberatively and unconsciously. Heuristics operate as intuitive processes which are rapid and can be reliable and effective. Deliberative decisions require time to complete and can be described by an analytic-deliberative model. The characteristics of these two processes and their relevance to preventive conservation decision-making are discussed. Each of these two processes has its strengths and weaknesses. People naturally make decisions and utilise a range of strategies without necessarily having insights into the process. This paper provides a frame to help examine, describe, and reflect upon our own and others’ decision-making in order to improve both processes and outcomes.     

论当前高师美术教育色彩课的几个授课环节

色彩课是高师美术教育的重要组成部分,为了突出学科特点,在授课过程中必须把握好授课环节,紧紧围绕培养学生的综合能力来进行强化训练,以达到最终教学目的。     

试论象征主义的新语境

象征主义绘画否定艺术模仿现实生活,以图形符号为载体,用象征的思维方式在想象中非逻辑性的、非概念性的、自由的重新构造现实世界,把纷繁复杂的现实生活作为人的自由生命意识的实现过程来加以重新感受、观照、体验和思索,从最平凡的生活中领悟出人的生命意义,用象征的方式传达出一定时代的文化信息.象征主义画家探索运用丰富多彩的甚至具有偶然性和随机效果的象征形式去表现生活,表现时代,具有生生不息的创作活力.     

Pepper Spray Cop and the American Dream: Using Synecdoche and Metaphor to Unlock Internet Memes’ Visual Political Rhetoric

Social media are increasingly important in protest movements for communication and organization. As such, scholars should consider these ephemeral messages as a tool for understanding such movements’ rhetoric. This article draws on Kjeldsen’s method for the critique of visual political rhetoric and adds consideration of intertextuality, synecdoche, and metaphor to demonstrate a method for the rhetorical analysis and a critique of Internet memes as visual, political rhetoric. The Pepper Spray Cop meme arising from Occupy Wall Street is presented as a case-study example. The article considers the centrality of the intertextual nature of memes as a unique form of visual rhetoric in activist contexts and contributes to the literature on user-generated and activist rhetoric.