Marianne North Gallery: Conserving the paintings

The Marianne North Gallery conservation project started a year ago in the newly built Preservation studio in the Herbarium at Kew

Uncovering the newly discovered painting

Consolidation of the flaking media

Marianne North painting discovery

Unknown to us all the first painting Rachael Smith, our recent addition to the team, was to conserve turned out to be a new painting rediscovered after 120 years. This is one of the most exciting revelations so far.

The painting was hidden under the backing board adhered by Marianne North while she was hanging the paintings. We have realised that Marianne North had created a very similar painting varying only in its composition. She chose to paint it in portrait size rather than landscape as she had done on the back of painting 366.

This has lead us to suppose that she was not happy with the composition and decided to use the back of the painting to paint a different landscape. She might have been running out of paper and made good use of it by creating a new painting which shows how Marianne adapted very quickly to any problems faced plus it was also a good way of recycling and economising.

Special treatment

The Marianne North Conservation Project started a year ago in a newly built Preservation studio in the Herbarium at Kew. There are currently three paper conservators and one technician working in the team.

The conservation team is focusing on the paintings that require the least amount of treatment first therefore the majority of our time is spent using surgical scalpels to remove the backing boards from the backs of all 833 Marianne North paintings.

Flaking paint

However the conservation work cannot be done if there is potentially friable or flaking paint on the surface as the treatment requires the paintings to be turned face down on our benches.

Therefore the media must to be examined under the microscope beforehand and any cracked or flaking paint is secured in place. We surface clean all of the paintings and reback them on to new conservationally sound boards after having removed all remnants of the adhesive from the back of paintings.

Removing the backing of a Marianne North painting

Backing boards

The majority of the paintings in the Marianne North Gallery are generally in reasonable condition considering their age but there are two main factors that contribute to their deterioration.

The first is that on returning to England, Marianne North backed all of the paintings on to boards which have since deteriorated with age and are now highly acidic.

This is a big problem given Marianne was using oil paints on to paper that has also started to become acidic as a result of being fixed to these deteriorating boards. Acidity in paper is a problem as it weakens and discolours the paper as well as affecting the media on it. So the backing boards need to be removed.

We surface clean all of the paintings and reback them on to new conservationally sound boards after having removed all remnants of the adhesive from the back of paintings.

Japanese paper

When we are treating the paintings where Marianne North painted on more than one piece of paper, we have to make sure the separate pieces of paper do not move out of register. Therefore Japanese paper is stuck to the front of the paintings while we remove the boards from the back.

Temperature and humidity

The second main problem with the paintings is that they have always been displayed in the Marianne North Gallery which has suffered from fluctuating temperature and humidity levels.

Some of the paintings therefore have been damaged by the paper becoming damp, this has caused the media to crack and in some cases fall off.

There are various other problems with the paintings, including that Marianne North often painted on more than one piece of paper and that the frames she chose did not provide a completely safe environment for the paintings. These are the two main issues we are dealing with in the conservation studio.

Other artworks

Expert conservators from the London based conservation and restoration company Plowden and Smith Ltd have just completed works on the other artworks which were housed in the Gallery. These include easel paintings, Marianne North bust and stenciled cove.

New finds

We have also discovered various inscriptions by Marianne North on the backs of paintings and the boards they were painted on.

Usually the inscriptions on the backs of paintings relate to the botanical names of the plants depicted on the front however the inscriptions on the boards are more descriptive. An example of this is on the back of painting no 823 'View of the Sugarloaf Mountain, from the Aqueduct Road, Rio Janeiro' where she describes the eating habits of a sloth (which is depicted, but very small, in the painting).