Technical Imaging for Private Practice Conservators

Abstract

ABSTRACT Technical imaging is a powerful group of tools and techniques that allow a work of art to be visually recorded under various wavelengths of light to document the current condition, detect restoration and alteration, identify condition issues, characterize materials and their location, and create a visual baseline for future study. Museum conservation laboratories have a long history of technical imaging, and its products are equally valuable for artworks outside museum collections. This article explains how private practice conservators can carry out advanced technical imaging like their museum counterparts with robust, reliable, and accessible tools. In this practical guide to imaging techniques for the private practice conservator, commercially available equipment and methods used by conservation professionals are examined; visible, ultraviolet, and infrared imaging methods are the primary topics. The article describes the components and function of a general technical imaging system, reviews the major technical imaging techniques and modes, discusses the equipment currently used in the field based on the results of a survey distributed to AIC members, and makes recommendations for equipment and methods for private practice conservators. Imaging examples include a painting attributed to Jean-Michel Basquiat, a seventeenth-century European painting, and a Liquitex acrylic paint color chart from 1989.