The authors describe a ground-breaking restoration treatment of a work of modern art at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam. The treatment comprised the repair of five slashes with a total length of 15 meters in the canvas support of Barnett Newman's monochrome painting, Cathedra (1951). Two different research programs were developed: an experiment on reconstructed canvases (Stedelijk Museum) and a computer simulation (Instituut Collectie Nederland and the Technische Universiteit Delft) showed that it would be possible to carry out a successful local mending of the cuts. The slashes were mended by a combination of gluing and stitching as well as by the application of tiny metal struts. Although the support didn't regain its initial flatness and the iridescence of the blue could not be matched perfectly by retouching, the restoration was declared a success, since the overall appearance of a blue entity dominated over the repairs.
Annotatie
Met lit. opg.- met samenvatting in het Frans en Engels
