Chemist transforms into art detective
Like many of the paintings whose secrets he has uncovered, Costas Karakatsanis traveled thousands of miles before arriving in Pittsburgh.
The Shadyside resident grew up in a 6,000-year-old town on Cyprus, an ancient Mediterranean island off the coast of Greece. He earned a doctorate in chemistry at the University of Pittsburgh and had a long career as a research chemist at Mobay Chemical Co. and Bayer Corp., where he specialized in polymers.
Affable and articulate, Mr. Karakatsanis has combined his rigorous scientific training with a passion for art to create a new niche for himself. For the past 11 years, he has arrived daily at the Carnegie Museum of Art in Oakland to examine artwork, search specialized databases, study catalogs and engage in the dogged detective work that reveals great stories about paintings.
He was 55 when he began appearing regularly at a group of desks the art museum keeps for volunteers.
“Costas was in more than out. Suddenly, one of those desks was his desk,” said Louise Lippincott, the museum’s curator of fine arts, a department that focuses on artworks created before 1945.
Ms. Lippincott soon realized the dedicated, disciplined scientist was a find.
“Costas has never been shy about pointing out where our existing records