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Paper conservation of eight Old Master prints from the collection of the Columbus Museum of Art was recently featured in a broadcast by WOSU Public Media Television of Columbus, Ohio. The conservation work was performed by Gina McKay, Senior Paper Conservator at McKay Lodge Conservation Laboratory, Inc. at The Ohio Conservation Center in Oberlin, Ohio.

The show’s title “Broad & High” is named after the two main intersecting streets in downtown Columbus, Ohio adjacent to Capitol Square and the Ohio Statehouse. The show was broadcast on Thursday December 26, 2019 at 8:00 PM and repeated on Sunday December 29, 2019 and 9:30 AM. It is now available on YouTube. The broadcast segment, the middle segment of three segments of the program “Broad & High” can be viewed below.

The segment presents behind-the-scenes paper conservation work on eight of the twenty-one  prints conserved for the Columbus Museum’s exhibition ‘A New Look at Old Masters.

A New Look At Old Masters: European Prints From The Permanent Collection

The Columbus Museum of Art

An exhibition of some 21 newly conserved, re-matted and re-framed prints by European Old Masters. Includes etchings by Rembrandt van Rijn, Francisco de Goya and Anthony van Dyck, among others. Many of the prints from the Thomas Ewing French Collection, which was the single largest print donation and bequest in Columbus Museum of Art’s (CMA’s) history.

The broadcast segment includes Columbus Museum of Art’s executive director Nannette Maciejunes presenting the context of the exhibition and the conservation work and senior paper conservator Gina McKay explaining various methods used in the paper conservation treatments for various conditions. In the video one can see paper conservation work in progress.

Conservator Gina McKay performs a paper mend under a stereo-microscope

The grant-funded project involved examinations and treatments of four prints by Jan van de Velde, and one each by Albrecht Durer (Nuremburg, Germany 1471-1528), Lucas van Leyden (Leiden, Netherlands 1494-1533), Rembrandt van Rijn (Leiden & Amsterdam, Netherlands 1606-1669, and Jusepe de Ribera (Xativa, Spain & Naples, Italy 1591-1652).

Gina McKay along with Robert Lodge, the founders of McKay Lodge Conservation Laboratory, have provided conservation to the collections of the Columbus Museum of Art for approximately 37 years, initially as conservators at the Intermuseum Conservation Laboratory of the Intermuseum Conservation Association (ICA). The Columbus Museum of Art was one of the original museum members of ICA. The two conservators continued work for the museum after the founding of McKay Lodge Conservation Laboratory, Inc. in 1990 and this museum has been among its most long-term and most active of its clients.

Bank Of America Conservation Project Grants

This paper conservation project was funded by a 2018 grant from The Bank of America to the Columbus Museum of Art, one of the twenty-one collecting institutions receiving this support that year:

  • Bass Collection in Miami
  • The Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia
  • Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen München in Munich
  • Bechtler Museum of Modern Art in Charlotte, N.C.
  • Columbus Museum of Art in Columbus, Ohio
  • Freer|Sackler in Washington, D.C.
  • Galleria Borghese in Rome
  • Guildhall Art Gallery in London
  • Hudson River Park Trust in New York City
  • Kunsthaus in Zurich
  • Montclair Art Museum in Montclair, N.J.
  • Museo de Arte de Lima in Lima, Peru
  • Museo Nacional De Antropologia in Mexico City
  • Museum of Photographic Arts in San Diego
  • National Gallery of Ireland in Dublin
  • Philadelphia Museum of Art in Philadelphia
  • Portland Art Museum in Portland, Oregon.
  • Tokyo National Museum in Tokyo
  • Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City
  • San Francisco Museum of Modern Art in San Francisco
  • Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond, Virginia

For more information on the Bank of America Conservation Projects Grants, visit their site.

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