CCI Newsletter, No. 22, November 1998

CCI Services: Seminars, Lectures, Workshops, and Visits

March

Bob Barclay gave a talk "Restoration of a Mercury Barometer" at the annual general meeting of the Literary and Historical Society of Quebec in Quebec City.

Bob Barclay and Tom Stone attended a one-week meeting of PREMA at the Institute of Archaeology in London, England, to redesign course offerings for the future.

Marie-Claude Corbeil was invited by the Chemical Institute of Canada to give a presentation "La chimie au service de l'art" to the Chemistry Department of Laval University in Quebec.

Tara Grant and Judy Logan presented a series of lectures on the conservation of archaeological material to students in the Art Conservation Program at Buffalo State College, NY.

George Prytulak travelled to Kitchener, ON, to advise on the outdoor display of industrial artifacts throughout the city.

David Grattan presented a paper "From '91 to 42—Questions of Conservation for Modern Materials" (co-authored by R. Scott Williams) at the conference "Mortality Immortality—The Legacy of 20th Century Art" hosted by the Getty Conservation Institute at the Getty Centre in Los Angeles, CA.

Janet Wagner gave a lecture on textile conservation at the first annual Stitchery Studio Seminar in Merrickville, ON.

Brian Laurie-Beaumont provided functional design guidance to the Assiniboine Pavillion Art Gallery project in Winnipeg, MB; he also visited Parkwood House in Oshawa, ON, to review facility developments needs; this was followed by site assessment visits in April by Siegfried Rempel, covering environmental control and collection preservation issues, and Bob Marchand, of the Museum of Nature, reviewing security concerns.

Tom Strang presented a lecture "Integrated Pest Management in Collections" to students in the Master of Art Conservation program, Queen's University, Kingston, ON.

Jean Tétreault presented a seminar on materials for exhibit, storage, and transport for the students of the specialized graduate program in preventive conservation at the University of Paris I, Panthéon Sorbonne; he gave a similar seminar to members of the Office de coopération et d'information muséographiques, and to members of the Association professionnelle de conservateurs-restaurateurs d'œuvres d'art in Brussels. Gregory Young presented a lecture "Analysis of the Royal Proclamation Charter of the Company of Adventurers, 2 May 1670" at a meeting of the Toronto Area Conservation Group as part of a three-part presentation of the Study, Analysis and Preservation of the Charter, with Kenneth Lockwood, President of Dorset Conservation, Inc., Toronto, ON, and Professor Thea Burns, Master of Art Conservation program, Queen's University, Kingston, ON.

The Royal Proclamation Charter of the Hudson Bay Company.

CCI Seminars

"Care of Textiles" Jan Vuori and Renée Dancause at The Museum for Textiles in Toronto, ON.

"Mount-making for Museum Objects" Bob Barclay, at the Centre de conservation du Québec.

April

Paul Bégin and Joe Iraci gave a joint presentation "Theory Guides, Experiment Decides: Working with Klaus" at the ICOM-CC Interim Meeting for the Graphic and Photographic Documents working groups in Ludwigsburg, Germany.

Leslie Carlyle presented a paper "Varnishing Practices in 19th Century Britain" at the Varnish Symposium of the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.

David Hanington gave a presentation on the treatment of the "Guard Book of Naval Manuscripts" for the Royal Military College, Kingston, ON.

Judy Logan gave a public lecture for the Center for Archaeological Investigations, Southern Illinois University, Carbondale; she presented a paper (co-authored by several staff) "Retrieving Organic Material from Archaeological Contexts" at a conference "Fleeting Identities: Perishable Material Culture in Archaeological Research" organized by the university; and she gave a presentation to the Ottawa-Hull Chapter of the Archaeological Institute of America.

Paul Marcon visited the Leonard & Bina Ellen Art Gallery of Concordia University in Montreal, QC, to examine their air conditioning equipment and make recommendations concerning its installation and performance.

Siegfried Rempel visited the Macdonald Stewart Foundation heritage building in Montreal, QC, to meet with architects to discuss conservation requirements in the context of planned renovations to the building; he also visited the Toronto Aerospace Museum in Downsview, ON, to advise on upgrading requirements for environmental control and collection preservation issues, along with Bob Marchand of the Museum of Nature who gave advice on security requirements.

Jane Sirois and Ian Wainwright visited the Redpath Museum, McGill University, Montreal, QC, to analyse selected ornithology specimens in their natural history collection for arsenic and mercury contamination.

Tom Strang gave two presentations on erosion and impact studies, site mapping, and artifact preservation techniques applied to the fossil forest on Axel Heiberg, Canada, at the International Conference on the Fossil Forest of Dunarobba, Italy.

Michael Harrington, Paul Heinrichsand James Bourdeau worked on a team for the Heritage Conservation Program of the Department of Public Works and Government Services to provide "D-class" cost estimates for the conservation of the interiors of the Centre Block of Parliament Hill in Ottawa, which should result in approximately $25 million of new conservation work for the professional conservation community; as part of the same program, Sherry Guild, David Hanington, and Paul Heinrichs developed a project and supervised the humidification and flattening of 4238 blueprints of the Centre Block by private-sector conservators. Jan Vuori and Season Tse presented a paper "Wet Cleaning an Oversized Historic Silk Hanging: A Unique Example of the Conservation Approach" at the 84th scientific session of the Institute of Textile Science in Mississauga, ON; the next day Season Tse visited the textile and paper conservation laboratories and storage areas of the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto.

Private-sector conservators treat blueprints of the Centre Block..

Gregory Young visited the Integrated Manufacturing Technologies Institute (IMTI) in London, ON, to discuss laser cleaning of cultural materials, the potential for collaboration, and to arrange for testing at IMTI of sample material using several types of laser.

May

At the 1998 Art Conservation Student Conference at Queen's University, Kingston, ON: Leslie Carlyle presented a paper "Flying Blind: Finding our Way through the Dark" and Kate Helwig presented a paper "Characterization of the Iron Oxide Pigments Using Physical and Chemical Analysis".

At the annual conference of the Canadian Association for Conservation (CAC) in Whitehorse, YK: Charlie Costain presented a paper "Wait a Minute! CCI Did NOT Say that Relative Humidity No Longer Matters!!"; Tom Stone presented a paper "Artifacts Revisited" and a paper on CCI's Aboriginal Issues Project during the CAC workshop "Critical Issues in the Conservation of Ethnographic Materials"; Jean Tétreault presented a paper on commercial coatings entitled "Repaint, Repaint and Thin No More!"; and Scott Williams chaired a technical session and presented a paper "On-site, In Situ Infrared Spectroscopic Analysis of Museum Objects Using a Portable Infrared Spectrometer at Museums Across the Country" (he also demonstrated the instrument at the Poster Sessions of the CAC conference and at the Trade Shows of the annual meetings of the Canadian Museums Association in Whitehorse and the American Institute for Conservation in Arlington, VA).

David Tremain, Paul Bégin, and Joe Iraci visited the Chambre de Commerce de Maniwaki and the Municipalité Egan-Sud to examine a collection of books, documents, and photographs.

Season Tse gave a lecture "Water Quality for Treatment of Paper and Textiles" at the National Archives of Canada, Ottawa, ON.

Lyndsie Selwyn displayed a poster and presented a lecture "Active Corrosion on Archaeological Iron" on behalf of co-authors Jane Sirois and Vasilike Argyropoulos at "Metal 98", the ICOM-CC Metal Working Group conference in Draguignan, France.

Deborah Stewart visited the Kings County Historical Society Museum in Hampton, NB, to provide museum staff with advice on their collections.

Judy Logan and Charlie Costain, along with Jennifer Hamilton (Parks Canada) and Valerie Thorp (Royal British Columbia Museum), organized and presented a pre-conference workshop on preventive conservation for archaeological collections at the Canadian Archaeological Association meeting in Victoria, BC.

Nancy Binnie worked with staff from Parks Canada's Underwater Archaeological Services in the development of an in situ monitoring program for the remains of an underwater prehistoric fishing weir located at Atherley Narrows (Mnjikaning) near Orillia, ON. Kate Helwig presented a paper "Infrared Analysis at the Canadian Conservation Institute: Infrared Spectroscopy, Microspectroscopy and Non-destructive Reflectance Spectroscopy" (co-authored with Elizabeth Moffatt, Scott Williams, and Gregory Young) at the Third International Infrared Users' Group Meeting in Winterthur, DE. Tom Strang gave a presentation "12 Milliseconds Flat" on principles and solutions for packaging sensitive objects so that they survive the risks of transit (co-authored by Paul Marcon) at the annual conference of the Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections, in Edmonton, AB.

Nancy Binnie examines zebra mussels on an underwater fishing weir stake at Atherley Narrows, ON.

CCI Seminars

"Cleaning with Caution: Conservation Housekeeping and Preventive Maintenance in Heritage Interiors" Jan Vuori and Janet Mason at Upper Canada Village, ON.

"Opening and Closing a Seasonal Museum" Deborah Stewart at the John Fisher Memorial Museum, Kingston Peninsula, NB.

June

Debra Daly Hartin visited Le Centre d'Archives du Séminaire de Saint-Hyacinthe to examine a painting by Louis Dulongpré as part of the technical study and treatment of three Dulongpré paintings in the Fine Arts laboratory; she also briefly examined Dulongpré paintings at the National Gallery of Canada and the National Archives of Canada in Ottawa.

Marie-Claude Corbeil and Kate Kelwig spent several days at the Musée du Québec and the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts taking samples from the paintings of Jean Dallaire; several other works by Dallaire from the collection of the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal were also sampled in August.

Jean Tétreault presented a paper "Museum Standard Levels for Indoor Pollutants" during the meeting "Indoor Air Pollution: Detection and Mitigation of Carbonyls" held at the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, Scotland.

Stefan Michalski presented a paper "Conservation of Museum Collections, A Systematic Approach" at the conference "Historical Heritage and the 21st Century. Its Conservation and Management in the New Millennium" sponsored by Ayuntamiento de Zamora and Caja Duero, organized by Gabinete de Estudios e Ingenieria in Zamora, Spain; he also presented two days of lectures on current issues in relative humidity, temperature, and lighting to professional conservators, and two days of lectures to students and staff at Escola Superior de Conservação et Restauro, Instituto Purtuguês de Museus, in Lisbon, Portugal.

Brian Laurie-Beaumont, together with Marc Gaudet, an engineer with Taylor Gaudet Partnership, made a site visit to the DesBrisay Museum and Exhibition Centre in Bridgewater, NS, to assess facility upgrading needs and potential operating cost savings.

At the 26th annual meeting of the American Institute for Conservation (AIC) in Arlington, VA: David Tremain presented a paper "Cultural Emergencies: The Canadian Response" and Paul Bégin presented a paper "Canadian Co-operative Permanent Paper Research Project: The Impact of Lignin on Paper Permanence" (a Certificate of Recognition for Excellence in Scientific/Technical Research was awarded to the group involved in this research: Paul Bégin, Joe Iraci, David Grattan, Elzbieta Kaminska, and Donna Woods of CCI, and X. Zou, N. Gurnagul, and S. Deschatelets of the Pulp and Paper Research Institute of Canada).

At the conference Fernis, Material Äesthetik Geschichte (Varnish: Material -Aesthetics -History) sponsored by the Arbeitsgemeinschaft der Restauratoren, Braunschweig, Germany: Leslie Carlyle presented a paper "Traditional Painting Varnishes Project: Preliminary Report on Natural and Artificial Aging and the Preparation of Cross-Sections" (co-authored by Nancy Binnie, Gisella van der Doelen and Jaap Boon from MolArt, and Bonnie McLean and Ann Ruggles from the National Gallery of Canada) and James Bourdeau acted as session chair and represented North American conservators on a panel discussion; prior to the conference he presented a seminar and workshop "Contemporary Varnishes, Materials and Techniques" at the Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museum in Braunschweig, to a group of conservators from various institutions and from private practice in Germany.

Bob Barclay gave a series of lectures on the treatment of ethnographic wooden objects for the International Course on Wood Conservation Technology in Oslo, Norway. Sherry Guild, David Hanington, and Tom Strang carried out a collection survey for the Library of Parliament, Ottawa. George Prytulak and Paul Heinrichs examined the brass doors of the Confederation Building in the Parliamentary Precinct in Ottawa.

Sherry Guild and David Hanington carry out a collection survey of the Library of Parliament in Ottawa.

July

James Bourdeau visited the conservation training program at the Fachhochschule in Cologne, Germany, to meet with the professors and deliver samples of Tyndall limestone from the interior of the Parliament Buildings in Ottawa for a research project on oxide removal conducted by one of the graduating students.

David Hanington visited the Conne River Micmac Band, Conne River Bay Despoir, NF, to discuss with the band and elders the treatment options for a rare hieroglyphic Micmac prayer book; he also made site visits to several departments at Memorial University, Queen Elizabeth II Library, Maritime History Archive, Folklore and Language Archive, Centre for Newfoundland Studies, and the Preservation Unit of the library.

Michael Harrington and Paul Heinrichs developed projects and supervised on-site work in conjunction with the private sector in the Speaker's Dining Room and the Prime Minister's office on Parliament Hill in Ottawa.

August

At the 44th International Conference on Analytical Sciences and Spectroscopy at Queen's University, Kingston, ON: Kate Helwig presented a paper "The Iron Oxide Pigments: From Red Earth to Mars Colours" and Gregory Young presented a paper "The Use of Differential Scanning Calorimetry and FTIR Microspectroscopy to Measure Deterioration and Treatment Effects in Museum Artifacts Composed of Skin, Hide and Similar Materials".

Sherry Guild and David Hanington carried out a collection survey for the City of Ottawa Archives.

Michael Harrington and Paul Heinrichs worked with private-sector conservators and contractors on a prototype project for the restoration of the historic brass window frames of the Bank of Montreal building located at the corner of Sparks and O'Connor in Ottawa.

Kate Helwig co-authored a paper "Siqueiros' Pyroxylines: Identification, Degradation and Similarities to Other of his Painting Techniques" (with principal author Celina Contreras Maya, Alison Murray, and Barbara Keyser) which was presented by Celina Contreras Maya at the National Meeting of the American Chemical Society in Boston, MA.

Stefan Michalski presented a paper "Status of the DHH-CCI Preventive Conservation Survey and its Database" at the annual meeting of the Organization of Military Museums of Canada, held at CFB 17 Wing, Winnipeg, MB.

George Prytulak examined three outdoor artifacts (a 1930s steam locomotive, an Avro CF-100 jet aircraft, and a commemorative stone cairn and plaque) for the City of North Bay, ON.

Season Tse visited the Textile Conservation Center and American Textile History Museum, Lowell, MA; she also presented a paper "Measuring Silk Deterioration: Investigation into the Usefulness of High Performance Size Exclusion Chromatography, Viscosity and Electrophoresis" at the 216th national meeting of the American Chemical Society "Historic Textiles and Paper Materials Symposium".

CCI Seminars

"Care of Industrial Collections" George Prytulak and Lyndsie Selwyn at the Prince of Wales Northern Heritage Centre, Yellowknife, NT.

September

At the 17th international congress of the International Institute for Conservation (IIC) "Painting Techniques: History, Materials and Studio Practice" in Dublin, Ireland: Leslie Carlyle acted as session chair and contributed as one of the authors to a paper "Nineteenth-century Paint Media: The Formulation and Properties of Megilps" and Kate Helwig presented a poster "Mars Colours: Preparation Methods and Chemical Composition". James Bourdeau presented a lecture on the conservation approach to maintenance and housekeeping for the Federal Heritage Buildings Review Office to managers and staff on Parliament Hill in Ottawa .James Bourdeau, Debra Daly Hartin, and Helen McKay began work on a survey of the artwork (including more than 150 paintings, sculptures, and carved reliefs, most of which date from the late 19th century) in Notre-Dame Basilica in Ottawa. Tom Stone travelled to Alberta where he undertook a collection survey for the Native Cultural Arts Museum in Grouard, visited museums in Peace River and Lac La Biche, and met with the Provincial Conservation Advisor in Edmonton. Marie-Claude Corbeil presented a paper "L'analyse de tableaux canadiens attribués au frère Luc" (prepared in collaboration with Elizabeth Moffatt) at "Art et Chimie - La couleur", an international conference on the contribution of chemistry to works of art, held in Paris.

James Bourdeau carries out a condition survey of the interior of Notre-Dame Basilica in Ottawa. Part of the collection that Tom Stone surveyed for the Native Cultural Arts Museum in Grouard.

Stefan Michalski gave lectures (along with Cecily Grzywacz from the Getty Conservation Institute and Jim Reilly from the Image Permanence Institute) on lighting and on mechanical issues in relative humidity at a two-day seminar "The Museum Environment", organized by the Upper Midwest Conservation Association, in St. Paul, MN.

George Prytulak examined a naval gun from the WWII frigate HMCS Buckingham displayed outdoors in Buckingham, QC; he also made several consultative trips within Saskatchewan, where he examined the doors of the Land Titles Building in Regina, the firebrick factory in Claybank, and the town bell in Moose Jaw.

Tom Strang delivered the keynote address to the 3rd Nordic Symposium on Insect Pest Control in Museums held at the Swedish Museum of Natural History in Stockholm; he also conducted the associated workshop section on thermal control methods.

Renée Dancause gave a talk "Conservation Treatment of a Canadian Militia Tunic" at the Brockville Museum, Brockville, ON.

CCI Seminars

"Care of Industrial Collections" George Prytulak and Lyndsie Selwyn at the Pioneer Acres of Alberta Museum in Irricana, AB.

October

Brian Laurie-Beaumont facilitated a planning meeting of museums and art galleries in the Halton and Peel regions of Ontario, who are looking to create a shared storage facility.

George Prytulak travelled to the Markham Museum and Historic Village in Markham, ON, to examine the 1920s railway business car "Acadia".

Tom Stone was a co-instructor on a two-week course on deterioration of collections for ICCROM/PREMA at the Fort Jesus Museum in Mombasa, Kenya.

Malcolm Bilz presented a paper "Treating Waterlogged Basketry: A Study of Polyethylene Glycol Penetration into the Inner Bark of Western Red Cedar" (co-authored with Tara Grant and Gregory Young) at the ICOM-WOAM (Wet Organic Archaeological Materials) conference in Grenoble, France.

Bob Barclay presented "Mounting and Transport of Museum Objects", at the PREMA International Course in Conservation, Cape Coast, Ghana.

David Hanington presented a two-day workshop "Protective Enclosures and Boxmaking" to students in the Collections Conservation and Management program, Sir Sandford Fleming College, Peterborough, ON.

Marie-Claude Corbeil co-authored a paper (with Stephen A. Kissin, Peter Whitridge, and James W. Helmer) on the source of meteoritic iron in artifacts from the Canadian Arctic; the paper was presented by Stephen A. Kissin at the annual meeting of the Geological Society of America in Toronto, ON.

David Grattan presented a lecture "Conservation and Exhibition Exchange—Roles and Responsibilities" (co-authored by Charlie Costain and Stefan Michalski) at the International Committee for Exhibition Exchange session, International Council of Museums Meeting, Melbourne, Australia.

CCI Seminars

"Emergency and Disaster Preparedness for Museums" Deborah Stewart and David Tremain, at Doon Heritage Crossroads, Kitchener, ON.