{"id":111,"date":"2015-09-06T07:34:42","date_gmt":"2015-09-06T07:34:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/grupo.us.es\/gapsc\/?page_id=111"},"modified":"2020-02-19T19:34:56","modified_gmt":"2020-02-19T19:34:56","slug":"assistance-to-art-curators","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/grupo.us.es\/gapsc\/assistance-to-art-curators\/","title":{"rendered":"Assistance to Art Curators"},"content":{"rendered":"

Overview<\/h2>\n

In the non destructive analysis of painting the study of the fabric of the canvas is of major importance. This analysis leads to interesting conclusions both on the conservation of the painting and on the relation of the painting to other pieces, usually from the same author. In old canvas we cannot, in most cases, use the back of the canvas, as it has been probably relined: a second cloth has been added to strengthen it. An X-ray is of help here, because prior to painting, a primer is applied on the fabric, making threads opaque to the X-ray. Furthermore, this primer acts as a glue, and areas where tension was applied remains tensioned even after the canvas is re-stretched. Hence, in areas near nails in the first stretcher bars used, we expect to observe a cusping effect. In this scenario, the characterization of the fabric for comparison purposes can be performed by simply counting the number of vertical and horizontal threads per centimeter. This is a tedious task that has been recently automated by Johnson et al, using Fourier transform.<\/p>\n

We have programmed it, in a software, and are at present testing it at the Museo Nacional del Prado with painting from the 16-17th century: Rubens, Fern\u00e1ndez Labrador, Van Dick,… As a second objective, apart from avoiding a manual task, is to provide museums with a reliable, repeatable and reproducible procedure, allowing for a protocol to be defined across painting restoration centers.<\/p>\n

\n
\n
\n

While most of the analysis reported results on plain-wave fabrics (tafet\u00e1n), we found other types of canvases in this time period that need to be described, e.g. canvases by El Greco or Murillo. This is a current line of research.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Impact<\/h2>\n

The Aracne software tool has been used in the following studies<\/p>\n

\n
\n
\n