Gilding is one of our in house skills example of our gilding work

Everingham Conservation  provides a high quality service for the conservation and restoration of fine art and decorative surfaces.

Paintings are valuable objects irrespective of their monetary worth. They can be objects of great beauty, important historical records, or simply cherished family possessions or heirlooms.

Paintings can deteriorate or sustain damage in several ways: dust and grime can obscure the image; discoloured varnish can affect subtle tonal changes; exposure to fluctuating temperature and humidity can lead to cracking and flaking paint; physical damage such as tears, punctures and scratches can occur during transport and handling. Restoration by a trained and experienced conservator may enhance the aesthetic and financial value of a painting for current and future generations.

Preventive conservation strategies, such as environmental control, or more practical measures, such as the attachment of backboards to paintings, can retard the deterioration of paintings and objet d’art.

The reason to restore art is to bring a work back to it’s former beauty.

Paintings fade and suffer contamination from a number of sources, restoring them not only makes them as lovely as the artist intended, but treating them with care and using further preventive measures while going through the process preserves the work for generations to enjoy.

A lot of skill and knowledge is required to carry out the delicate work of art restoration not only will a proffesional restore a much loved piece, it will have gained substantially in value at the same time.

Paintings can deteriorate or sustain damage in several ways: dust and grime can obscure the image; discoloured varnish can affect subtle tonal changes; exposure to fluctuating temperature and humidity can lead to cracking and flaking paint; physical damage such as tears, punctures and scratches can occur during transport and handling. Restoration by a trained and experienced conservator may enhance the aesthetic and financial value of a painting for current and future generations.

Preventive conservation strategies, such as environmental control, or more practical measures, such as the attachment of backboards to paintings, can retard the deterioration of paintings and objet d’art.

Restoring a piece of art requires several steps before the actual work begins for example:

We use often carry out an  ‘Ultra Violet Light’ scan , this frequently highlights a possible previous restoration. When are happy we our scan we then carry out exploratory spot cleaning in a multitude of areas, we gradually and progressively increase solvent strength to establish what lay below varnish layers. At this stage we are able to understand exactly what type and amount of work is required to successfully restore a painting.

You can imagine that this is not a task for the untrained eye ! now we move to our next step which will be to consult the client. We can do this in a number of ways such as, face to face on site or at our studio, should distance be an issue then, we can always use digital photography to support our findings and keep clients updated with progress.

Now the long process of full restore can take place, this may also involve this could also encompass re-lining and in extreme cases new stretchers.

Depending on the period of the work differing pigments must be mixed to so as to match the original as close as possible.

At this time we are infilling to repair and restore, the restorer must consider the original style and brush  stroke actions just as if he or she were the  original artist, if this protocol is not followed then sadly the finished project be may be far removed from  it’s origin.

Tremendous skill and understanding has to be used during this process, this is most certainly not a task for the amateur restorer.

At this stage of the process a decision has to be made regarding the correct choice of varnish finish as follows:

A varnish is applied to work of art for protection and long term preservation this is offered in a range of finishes, choose from Matt, Semi Matt right up to a full Gloss, in either oil or acrylic, depending on our clients preferences.

They are applied by hand or spray to suit the work and style of the painting. The current trend, and our preference would be an oil based Semi Matt finish to reduce reflections and minimise glare.