Artwork required creative thinking
Precious pastel cartoon tested the skills of team at Sarjeant Gallery
Arare chalk pastel cartoon for a large mural/ fresco that PreRaphaelite artist Edward Burne-Jones never executed is held in the Sarjeant Gallery collection in Whanganui.
A smaller preparatory watercolour of the full work The Fountain of Youth is held at the Tate Gallery in London so the one the Sarjeant holds is the only section ever created to the work’s intended scale.
The work is a cartoon, which is the name of a preparatory drawing for part of an artwork. It is large (1596 x 1605 x 35mm), weighty and, along with the ornate frame, it was in need of attention to ensure the work was preserved and its life prolonged for as long as possible. As a result, the frame and drawing have been separated for more than a decade and will be reunited for exhibition at the reopening of the redeveloped gallery later this year.
The chalk pastel is on brown woven paper, lined on to linen and stretched over an openbacked wooden stretcher. It depicts the right third of the planned composition in which various figures, clothed and unclothed, are bathing and interacting.
A team of three collaborated on the project, funded by the Stout Trust; materials conservateur Detlef Klein, specialist designer and manufacturer Aaron Roberts, both of Manawatū Museum Services, and the Sarjeant’s curator of collections Jennifer Taylor Moore.
The team is delighted with the results of their collective problem-solving.
“Jennifer’s mind is always one step ahead of other people’s, thinking of an extra solution that will really work well,” Klein said.
“I’ve known her for 30 years and she comes up with these amazing ideas, questions and challenges. And then you say, okay, let’s work it out.”
To protect the chalk pastel, they needed a transparent cover. However, that immediately posed a problem on account of material choices, the potential weight of the protected work, and health and safety issues in lifting and transporting it.
“Pastel is extremely sensitive to touch and to any kind of static loading. So if you have glass or normal perspex in front of the pastel, which you need in order to protect the pastel from inadvertent touching and therefore damage, you can’t have something that ‘charges up’ when you clean the glass or perspex because it’ll pull off fine particles of insecure pastel dust.”
Despite being covered with glass when stored in the basement of the Sarjeant on Queen’s Park, that material was no longer an option. The correct specifications required today
Jennifer’s mind is always one step ahead of other people’s, thinking of an extra solution that will really work well. Materials conservateur Detlef Klein
It looks like it’s all complete and sealed in together. But it’s not. So you have two items, which are much safer to move, much safer to store. Materials conservateur Detlef Klein
would have made it too heavy for even four people to carry and there was the added risk of possible damage to both humans and artwork should it break. Then there was the additional weight of the ornate frame.
Ordinary perspex would “charge up” when cleaned; however, a special kind of perspex provided the answer. Optima has been used and tested by Te Papa, Auckland Art Gallery and other institutions over the past 15 years.
“This is an anti-static loading perspex of high clarity and is nonreflective,” Klein said. “It’s light and won’t break and it meets the health and safety regulations for an artwork that size. However, it’s not available in New Zealand unless you import it from America.”
Thanks to the Stout Trust funding, the perspex was duly ordered and the artwork enclosed inside a custom-built, aluminium-framed, sealed unit designed and made by Roberts. The unit provides a separate support system for the artwork.
The restoration work on the ornate frame, made by BurneJones’ father, a frame maker, was less challenging; however, they had to modify the back of the frame, the rebate system, in which the artwork sits.
“We had to slightly increase the width of the inside fitting of the frame so that we could accommodate the new, extra aluminium frame.”
So now the artwork comprises two separate “packages” — a sealed unit that can be hung on its own and a frame that, with some extra fittings, fits over the top.
“It looks like it’s all complete and sealed in together. But it’s not. So you have two items, which are much safer to move, much safer to store.”
The work is among five gifted by Lord Leverhulme to the Sarjeant Gallery in 1924.
The British peer’s soap company made Sunlight Soap which later grew into the Unilever global brand.
He visited New Zealand just after the Sarjeant opened in 1919 and loved the gallery, Taylor Moore said.
“He built an art gallery in Port Sunlight called the Lady Lever Gallery, named after his wife, where he displayed his amazing collection.
“There are bigger galleries in New Zealand but he chose to give some to Whanganui. So we’re very thankful for his gift.”
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The Fountain of Youth can be viewed online at https:/ /collection.sarjeant.org.nz