How did the ancient Greeks make their characteristic red-and-black pottery? Modern science may finally yield the answer. More»
Why the manuscript illuminations in Florence at the Dawn of the Renaissance really rock. More»
The Panel Paintings Initiative is training the next generation of conservators of paintings on wood panels, and including professionals from Eastern Europe is a high priority. In this post, Polish conservator Aleksandra Hola describes her experience with the program. For… More»
This is the third in a series of conservators’ reflections on artworks in Pacific Standard Time. Robert Graham’s sculpture Untitled came to the Museum last October for Crosscurrents in L.A. Painting and Sculpture 1950-1970. It’s a small wax banana resting… More»
It’s official—abstract expressionist painter Jackson Pollock’s seminal work Mural (1943) will be undergoing technical study and conservation at the Getty Center as part of a new collaboration between the Getty and the University of Iowa Museum of Art. The painting… More»
This is the second in a series of conservators’ reflections on artworks in Pacific Standard Time. In 1964 Judy Chicago created this wall-mounted sculpture, Car Hood, from a steel car hood and traditional automotive paint. The work was on loan… More»
What’s inside this tent? Henry Moore’s monumental sculpture Bronze Form 5/6—normally the first artwork visitors see when arriving at the Getty Center—is undergoing a conservation treatment behind a rather mysterious-looking safety screen. My colleagues and I will be working on… More»
When you look at sculpture in the Getty Museum’s galleries, you wouldn’t guess that some of the pedestals are somewhat unusual. Under their polished veneer, they’re engineered to protect art from the movements caused by earthquakes. Many museums in California… More»
Despite the increased recognition that works of modern architecture such as the Sydney Opera House, Le Corbusier’s Chapel of Notre Dame du Haut in Ronchamp, France, or Mies Van der Rohe’s IIT College of Architecture campus are culturally significant and… More»
Since 2008, the antiquities conservation and curatorial departments at the J. Paul Getty Museum have been working with colleagues at the Antikensammlung in Berlin to study and conserve a group of South Italian (Apulian) vases dating to the 4th century… More»
Remarkably realistic for medieval illuminated beasts, which were often fabulous admixtures of fantasy and fur. The unicorn is clearly drawn from life, for example.