Evening Republican, Volume 18, Number 169, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 July 1914 — SAVING ART IRKS [ARTICLE]

SAVING ART IRKS

How Paintings Hacked by Women Are Restored. Professionals Only Need a Hot Ironi Strong Fish Glue, Manila Paper and New Canvas—Many Men Are Experts. * —•=. London.—Although Mr. Sargent-8 portrait of Mr. Henry the not 1 - elist, was badly hacked by a cleaver wielded by a suffragette at the opening of the Royal academy, it will not be an over difficult task to repair it. The work of restoration has been intrusted to Maj. George C. Roller, says London Tit-Bits.

In restoring the portrait the canvas, after the painted surface has been protected with tissue paper, will be placed on a slate table. The back will then be covered with a sticky fluid, which will be pressed through to the surface of the picture with a heated iron. In this way the canvas will contract, and the cuts in it will close up. The canvas will finally be —relined, and many spots where paint may be missing will be filled in by the restorer with a special preparation. There are men in London who fob low the profession of picture restoring; who are able to restore old paintings of value which have large holes in them, or the materials on which they are executed hanging in threads Moreover, they can, when necessary, transfer a painting to a new canvas. If a picture of which the canvas is cracked, torn or rotted wit£ age is handed to a clever restorer, the first •thing he does is to purchase a neir canvas the same size as the old one. Having obtained this, he glues a sheet of stout manila paper to the picture. He then carefully scrapes away the old canvas, This is a job that might oocupy him for several days, or week* if the canvas is a large one. Having removed every bit of canvas, the grounds upon which paint lies are taken away by solvents or gentle scraping, until nothing remains but the fragile shell of pigment adhering to the paper. The new canvas is then covered with the strongest fish glue obtainable, and pressed firmly down upon the paper bearing the picture. As soon as the painting is firmly attached to its neW foundation nothing remains but to take off the manila paper. This can be done with hot water, and the Burface of the painting has only to be cleaned to look as bright as it waa when the artist painted it We believe it was M. Haquin, a French artist of note, who first sue* cessfully transferred a panel painting to canvas. He glued a sheet of paper over the surface of the paiptlnf, and afterward upon this a fine layer of muslin. When the glue was dry he planed down the panel until it was ot the thinness of match wood, when he scraped off the remainder with a long, flexible knife. This done, the men skin of color held together by the paper and muslin was left, and it was a comparatively easy task to glue this to a canvas and remove the paper an< muslin. If an old picture has a portion of its pigment missing this may be replaced by an artist with colors from a brush but sometimes old hat worthless paint ings are used for the purpose. When the coloring of the drapery flesh, foliage or sky, as the case ma] be, is found to match exactly the missing portion tt ls cnt"cnit to stzH ant glued on the canvas, the edges of th# joint being made imperceptible by tht aid of the brush.