2:30 p.m., Aug. 28, 2007--This summer I am completing my eight-week summer work project at the Western Center for Conservation of Fine Art (WCCFA) located in downtown Denver. WCCFA is not a museum or a regional center for conservation, but a privately owned conservation business that specializes in the treatment of paintings. WCCFA provides conservation services to institutions and art collectors across the West, an underserved region of the country in regard to art conservation. In fact, many artworks come to WCCFA from neighboring states Utah, Wyoming, Kansas and Oklahoma, none of which has a resident private paintings conservator. At the WCCFA, I am working with four paintings conservators, including Carmen Bria and Camilla Van Vooren both WUDPAC grads. Each is supervising me on a separate project, and their different educational backgrounds and work experience is promoting a rich learning experience for me.

Thus far, I have completed two treatments. The first was a removal of yellowed varnish and revarnishing of The Artic King by Alaskan artist Sydney Laurence. The second was the cleaning of a mountain scene by contemporary artist Wayne Wolfe, which had been splattered with soda pop. I am also working on a large, long-term conservation effort of the painting Mt. Rainier by John Fery. Railroad companies hired Fery to paint scenes of the West to promote travel, vacationing and settling in the West. Fery painted hundreds of these scenes, which today are very collectible. The painting was displayed outdoors in Montana for years and suffered severe damage from exposure to the elements, including severe build-up of surface grime and extensive flaking and loss of paint. The treatment began by consolidating unstable paint with Beva 371, a conservation adhesive, and then cleaning grime and excess adhesive from the surface with a xylene emulsion. Further treatment will include lining the painting with a secondary support fabric for stability, filling paint losses, and inpainting losses to match surrounding paint. The fourth treatment is a remedial stabilization treatment of Portrait of Russian Singer G. Pustovoit by Alexander Lubimov.

Besides my work at the WCCFA, a summer in Denver has provided many other cultural events and amusements. The Denver Cultural Complex is home to the Michael Graves-designed Denver Public Library and the Denver Art Museum campus with buildings designed by Gio Ponti and Daniel Libeskind, where I visited the collections and toured the conservation facilities. I have also been able to visit the Denver Botanical Gardens and the “Titanic: The Artifact Exhibition” at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. And, of course, Denver has been the perfect place to enjoy hiking and biking.