Image: Cybele Tom sharing her work on the Seated Guanyin, Song dynasty (960–1279), Paulownia wood with polychromy and gilding, 158.0 x 97.8 cm (H: 62 1/4 x W: 38 1/2 in), Lucy Maud Buckingham Collection, 1923.921 www.artic.edu
TSA Affinity Group Meeting
Textiles × Science : Conservation × Science
Saturday October 23rd,
1:00 PM- 2:30 PM EDT/12:00 PM – 1:30 PM CDT/10:00 AM – 11:30 AM PDT
Email textilesxscience@gmail.com for Zoom link.
Few people get to engage with works of art directly, yet this is a key feature and privilege of conservation work. Through close looking, intimate interaction, consultation, collaboration, and scientific analysis, conservators and scientists piece together the evidence of what remains to give insight into an object’s complex narrative. This enables us to reconstruct and repair the work and also to contribute to a deeper understanding of a cultural and artistic tradition. Issues concerning preserving, caring, and repairing objects–and the inescapable reality of obsolescence and decay–are often personal ones. A conservator’s unique perspective opens a transcendent connection with the object’s makers and users. Through conservation work, we gain a fresh perspective on the incredible things that human beings from diverse cultures and world views craft to create their world…providing solace and connection in our shared human experience.
Please join us as four conservators and conservation scientists share highlights of their works and engage in an open conversation about the experience of engaging with works of art.
Panelists:
Cybele Tom is an objects conservator and PhD candidate in Art History at the University of Chicago.
Clara Granzotto, PhD is a conservation scientist at the Art Institute of Chicago.
Maria Cristina Ramos Rivera is a paper conservator at the Art Institute of Chicago.
Sarah Molina, PhD candidate in art history at Harvard University and former National Science Foundation Fellow at the Art Institute of Chicago.
Discussants:
Annabelle Camp is a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellow in the Winterthur/University of Delaware Program in Art Conservation, specializing in textiles with a minor in organic objects.
Kris Cnossen is a Graduate fellow at the Winterthur/University of Delaware Program in Art Conservation, specializing in textiles with a focus on modern and contemporary art and materials.
Moderators:
Isaac Facio and Elizabeth Pope
TEXTILES × SCIENCE initiative is an interdisciplinary platform for innovation through textiles.
Textiles × Science is a material technology research platform focused on the fundamentally collaborative nature of craft, research, and invention. We aim to harness a collective of expertise across the arts and sciences through interdisciplinary research projects, mentorship, curatorial and technical collaborations, exhibitions, and outreach within the areas of applied sciences and technology, mathematics, engineering, architecture, in partnership with textiles and fiber-based media.
This platform is an invitation for technologists and scientists to explore previously unidentified mutual exposures in textiles with members of the Textile Society of America. These newly found exposures will lead to the possibility of new works of benefit through functional, technical and artistic approaches. It is in the blend of disciplines that the most innovative, approachable and relevant work resides and aims to provide the catalyst for discoveries through this interaction.
Instagram: @textiles_x_science
Facebook: @textilesxscience
Email: textilesxscience@gmail.com
