Deciding What to Preserve When a Contemporary Work Begins to Fail
An artist's studio paint, a sheet of early plastic, or a length of fluorescent tube will not last the way a fifteenth-century panel has lasted. Many of the materials of the last century were chosen for their effect, their availability, or their cost, and how they would behave over decades was simply not known at the time. That fact sits underneath most questions about contemporary art conservation in London, because the decision facing the owner is rarely technical alone. Before any treatment is chosen, someone has to settle what the work actually is, and what it would mean for it to survive.
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