Conservation Gets Ready for Made in the USA

Conservators at The Phillips Collection have been getting ready for Made In The USA, the exhibition celebrating the return of the collection’s American masterworks after almost five years on tour. A few works that did not go on tour but will be featured at the Phillips this spring and summer have recently received attention to treat structural issues such as canvas distortions and insecure paint. In addition, all of the works required cleaning to remove dulling layers of surface grime.

Setting down raised cracks and consolidating insecure paint on "No. 9" by Bradley Walker Tomlin. Top: The painting is raised on blocks and a suction apparatus is placed behind the canvas to aid in consolidation and drying. Bottom: Adhesive is wicked into the paint cracks using a small brush. Suction from the reverse helps pull the adhesive into the cracks as well as to pull lifting paint into plane as the adhesive dries.

Setting down raised cracks and consolidating insecure paint on “No. 9” (1952) by Bradley Walker Tomlin.
Top: The painting is raised on blocks and a suction apparatus is placed behind the canvas to aid in consolidation and drying.
Bottom: Adhesive is wicked into the paint cracks using a small brush. Suction from the reverse helps pull the adhesive into the cracks as well as to pull lifting paint into plane as the adhesive dries.

FieneStructural

Structural treatment to reduce canvas distortions in “Fall of Old Houses” (undated) by Ernest Fiene.
Top left: The painting is carefully removed from the stretcher and the folded over edges are flattened using controlled moisture and gentle heat from a heated spatula.
Top Right: Strips of linen canvas are prepared.
Bottom: With the painting off its stretcher and laying face-down on the table, strips of linen canvas are attached to reinforce the tacking edges. The painting will be placed in a work stretcher so that all of the canvas is accessible, and the distortions will be relaxed and reduced using controlled humidification and suction.

P1010310

Using a soft sponge to remove grime from the surface of “Gray Buildings” (1925) by Niles Spencer.

frameretouching

Watercolors are used to retouch minor losses on the frame for “Grey Buildings” by Niles Spencer.

P1010308

Removing dark grey grime from the unvarnished surface of “Catalpa in Bloom” (undated) by Anne Goldthwaite.

After cleaning, applying wax to the surface of "Ancestor" (1958), by Seymour Lipton.

After cleaning, applying wax to the surface of “Ancestor” (1958), by Seymour Lipton.

Other works treated for the touring exhibition in the past five years include:

Josef Albers, Homage to the Square (1957)

Milton Avery, Black Sea (1959)

Alexander Calder,  Red Polygons (ca. 1950)

Stuart Davis, Eggbeater No. 4 (1928)William Gropper, Minorities (1938 or 1939)

Marsden Hartley, Off the Banks at Night (1942)

Edward Hicks, The Peaceable Kingdom (between 1845 and 1846)

Stefan Hirsch, Mill Town (ca. 1925)

Karl Knaths, Deer in Sunset  (1946)

Walt Kuhn, Plumes (1931)

Seymour Lipton, Ancestor (1958)

Loren MacIver, New York (1952)

Peppino Mangravite, Political Exiles (ca. 1928)

Grandma Moses, Hoosick Falls in Winter (1944)

Alfonso Ossorio, Mother and Child (1951)

Theodoros Stamos, Sacrifice of Kronos (1948)

Bradley Walker Tomlin, No. 8 (1952)

Jack Tworkov, Highland (1959)

Painting the Wind

Harold Weston, Winds, Upper Ausable Lake, 1922

Harold Weston, Winds, Upper Ausable Lake, 1922. Oil on canvas, 16 1/8 x 22 3/16 in. Gift of Mrs. Harold Weston, 1981. The Phillips Collection, Washington DC.

This work by Harold Weston, part of the Made in the USA exhibition, captures the power of the wind in the pulsing ripples on the surface of the lake, bright morning sunlight glinting off each peak.

Made in the USA: E Pluribus Unum

Charles Sheeler, Skyscrapers, 1922. Oil on canvas, 20 x 13 in. Acquired 1926. The Phillips Collection, Washington DC

Made in the USA, which opens tomorrow, shines a light on the strength of American artists in The Phillips Collection. 80% of our collection is by American artists. At the time of Duncan Phillips’s death in 1966, there were about 2,000 works in the collection; 1,400 were American. Many of them were by living artists and quite a few were at the beginning of their careers. The last time the museum devoted this much space to American art was in 1976, in honor of the country’s bicentennial. Through this survey of fifty years of Duncan Phillips’s collecting, we hope to illustrate how he defined the modern spirit of American Art.