Many of the watercolours and drawings I am asked to conserve for museums and galleries are by amateur artists from the 18^th to the early 20^th century.  The value is not in their artistic merit but in the fact that they depict changing or vanished topographical views.  As such they are a unique record, often pre-dating photography, of the appearance and life in and around towns and city centres.

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Although I have sometimes been called upon to treat ancient manuscripts on parchment and papyrus, the earliest works on paper that I had conserved were Italian Old Master drawings and German engravings from the early 15^th century.  That is until now, after I was asked by curator, Antonia Lovelace, from Leeds Museums and Galleries to conserve and mount two sheets from a Qur’an for the new Visions of Asia gallery at Leeds City Museum. Continue reading…

Posters produced to advertise railway companies and their destinations were not expected to last longer than their brief period of display. The papers on which they were printed contained low quality wood pulp and the inks were bulked out with cheap extenders. They were pasted to billboards and walls and often torn down or covered with next season’s designs. Although they were mass produced, the fact that examples from the nineteenth century had survived at all is remarkable.

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With the centenary of the First World War upon us, there have been a number of enquiries relating to the preservation of documents relating to its history. As well as family collections of letters and photographs, Artworks Conservation have also conserved several Rolls of Honour from various institutions.

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