O’Keeffe Conservation Project Receives $349,988 from National Endowment for the Humanities
The grant funds the project “Metallic Soap Protrusions on
Georgia O’Keeffe’s Paintings: A Methodology to Diagnose Morphological and Chemical Changes”
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE—December 28, 2017 (Santa Fe, NM)— The Georgia O’Keeffe Museum is proud to partner with scientists from Northwestern University/Art Institute of Chicago Center for Scientific Studies in the Arts (NU-ACCESS) on a groundbreaking conservation and engineering project supported by an award of $349,988 from the National Endowment for the Humanities. NU-ACCESS received the grant to advance scientific imaging and technologies to protect paintings vulnerable to deterioration caused by their own materials’ chemical changes. Specifically, this collaborative endeavor with the Museum will develop 3-D imaging technology that will assess the growth of destructive soaps in Georgia O’Keeffe’s oil paintings.
Soaps result from the combination of an alkaline substance with a fat. In the case of the study’s subjects, soaps form when the fats in oil paint reacts with alkaline materials, such as pigments and drying agents. Soaps can cause discoloration and deformities. Damage by soaps affect approximately 70% of paintings in all museum collections. The need to develop an accurate, yet non-invasive, monitoring tool is immense. 3-D imaging will allow researchers to examine the works at a microscopic level, and record data about the soaps’ development—without physically altering the paintings.
The results will guide preservation decisions for O’Keeffe’s work. They will also produce a set of web-based image processing tools, and promote exchanges of related research among conservators around the world. Dale Kronkright, Head of Conservation at the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum, says, “We first began using 3-D imaging to monitor the preservation of Georgia O’Keeffe’s paintings and pastels in 2011. This award by the National Endowment for the Humanities propels the development of those first trials into a mature set of new scientific tools for the conservation community.”
The project will run for approximately two years. It will begin in spring of 2018.
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ABOUT THE GEORGIA O’KEEFFE MUSEUM: Since 1997, the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum has
shared the art, life, and story of Georgia O’Keeffe with visitors from around the world. Located in
New Mexico, where Georgia O’Keeffe lived the final decades of her life, the O’Keeffe has sites
and experiences in two historic destinations, Santa Fe and Abiquiú. For more information, please visit okeeffemuseum.org.
