Hidden from the IRS? The Nazis? Technology and luck help to find lost
masterpieces.
Hidden
Paintings: Lost and Forgotten, But Now They Are Found
Do I hear and “Amen!” to the fact that one of the most
entertaining thoughts as a collector is to find another painting under the one
you bought?! OMGosh, the stories that are told about hiding art from the Nazis
or the IRS (no, I won’t comment), artists reusing their canvases and many more
are plentiful and we hear them often here at Fine Art Conservation Laboratories. I have
so many great stories of our adventures that my office manager keeps insisting
that I write a book. Many of these stories involving “discovering hidden art.” I
don’t think I’ll be a threat, however, for Daniel
Silva! I do get comments once in awhile that I remind people of
his main character who is an art
restorer and spy. I read one of his books on a plane trip a few
months ago. It was a page turner and I read the whole thing on the round trip.
One of the investigative tools that I use in professional
art conservation is an infrared reflectometer to look
under the thin layers of paint to see what we can see. In fact I made a video
about “Hidden Signatures on
Paintings Discovered with Infrared” that has
been quite popular and educational for art collectors. In fact, I was called
and then used as the main expert on the hugely popular CNBC television series Treasure Detectives for their
final episode of last season.
I used an infrared reflectometer when we received into the
lab a really nice California Coastal scene by Orrin White, perhaps the nicest
painting by this artist that I had ever seen. The back of the painting was
painted white. An odd thing. So, we looked at this white backside and saw a ghost
image in the monitor of a mountain, trees and perhaps a lake. The owner agreed
to a cleaning test and we were able to remove some white paint to reveal the
nice colors of the painting underneath. Finally, the curiosity was too much for
the owner and we cleaned the white paint off to reveal…
At this point, I’m almost always asked, “Can you split the
canvas so to end up with two paintings?” No, paintings on canvas cannot be
done. However, I have done this work on a double sided artist pulp board panel that
was made from layers of paper and that was thick enough to split safely for the
paintings.
Cleaning off the overpaint from a painting that’s been
“hidden” is a sketchy proposition. It worked to perfection in the painting
mentioned above. But was less successful, yet super intriguing, with a portrait
of well know LA art dealer, Earl Stendahl by an artist named Werner in 1932. The
painting belonged to the old art dealer’s grandson but on the back of the
painting was noted the Guy Rose estate stamp and an exhibition label for Rising
Mists by Guy Rose. Whaaa?!?!?!
After inspection
with infrared and the above described cleaning tests, it was decided to
get into the removal of the portrait to rediscover the long lost painting by
Guy Rose. Here’s what the result of the portrait removal was…
While the final picture matched the post-mortum exhibition
catalog illustration for Rising Mists, the sale of the painting afterwards has
not been successful. Personally, I like the picture a lot.
We’ve got another painting in the lab that has an abstract
figurative painting over what appears as a landscape underneath. The top
painting is flaking badly. The family history on the painting is that it was
being hid back in the 1930’s from debt collectors cause it was super valuable.
We’ll see… I’ve also had paintings brought to me that were painted over
treasure maps being hid from the Nazis and smuggled out. A waste of time? Well,
at least there’s a good story and a “look” in the eye of the owner.
I also once found an ad for a horseless carriage stretched
over stretcher bars UNDER another stretched canvas of a historical building
done in 1906. That was fun, but not as interesting as the recent article you
can read here:
Museum has one more painting than it thought
Another work discovered during restoration of
Frank C. Ashford painting July
20, 2013|Staff reports
When a Frank C. Ashford painting was sent to
Minneapolis to be restored, the Dacotah Prairie Museum found it had one more
Ashford painting than it thought.
The museum has long owned an original
Ashford oil painting called “Portrait of a Young Woman.” With the support of
the Yellow Brick Road Quester Club, the museum hired the Midwest Art
Conservation Center in Minneapolis to restore “Portrait of a Young Woman.”
While the painting was in Minneapolis, the
conservator removed the canvas from the frame to discover another painting of
another young woman underneath.
“This new Ashford painting, which will
become part of the museum collection, is truly a gift since no one knew of its
existence,” according to a museum news release.
The two pieces will be jointly unveiled at
a reception on Tuesday.
The revitalization of “Portrait of a Young
Woman” was completed with money raised by Aberdeen's Yellow Brick Road Quester
Club and a South Dakota Preservation and Restoration Grant from the state
Questers organization.
http://articles.aberdeennews.com/2013-07-20/lifestyle/40699714_1_ashford-painting-museum-collection
So, if you’ve read this far you are seriously in love with
the art world. I trust you know the in’s and out’s of utilizing UV to inspect
paintings for previous restorations and monkey business? It’s a major point of
focus to learn to use this technology well, as an art collector. This is the
due diligence that will raise questions that will save you $10,000’s or more,
depending on your budget. Here’s a link to some videos and more info: UV
Blacklight info
For a news
article featuring Scott M. Haskins’, Click here: http://www.fineartconservationlab.com/media-room/art-restorerconservator-scott-m-haskins-featured-in-life-section-of-newspaper/
For art conservation and painting restoration questions call
Scott M. Haskins 805 564 3438 or faclartdoc@gmail.com
For art appraisal questions call Richard Holgate at 805 895
5121 or jrholgate@yahoo.com
See short videos by Scott M. Haskins on art conservation
related subjects at YouTube channel “Bestartdoc” http://www.youtube.com/user/bestartdoc?feature=mhee
See short do-it-yourself videos on collection care and emergency
preparedness for art collectors, family history items, heirlooms, memorabilia
at Youtube Channel “preservationcoach”
http://www.youtube.com/user/preservationcoach
To learn more about what you can do at home to take care of
your stuff, download now a copy of Scott Haskins’ book, How To Save Your Stuff
From A Disaster at 50% off! CLICK HERE to know more: http://saveyourstuffblog.com/products-supplies/
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