restoration acrylic paint wall painting Lucebert in Erasmus University Rotterdam
lucebert ‘Eating people’
‘Eating people’ is a wall painting from 1969, painted with acrylic paint and oil marker by Lucebert on behalf of the Erasmus Universiteit te Rotterdam for the cafeteria of the new building. This is also clearly visible in the depiction of people grinning and eating, but also by the blackboard mounted on the left part. There the student could write down his comments on the food! Now the 300x600cm large work hangs in corridor A building, of the Erasmus University at Burgemeester Oudlaan 50, Rotterdam.
The managers of the EUR art collection started in July 2013 with an inventory of the conditions of the artwork. Lucebert’s ‘Eating People’ is an important work in their collection. Three restoration studios were invited to draw up a condition report and a conservation and restoration proposal, including Marjan de Visser Restoration Workshop. In January 2015, Marjan de Visser received the order confirmation. In March 2015, Marjan de Visser and Amelie Schwark worked on this mural for two weeks. see the photo restoration acrylic paint wall painting Lucebert in Erasmus University Rotterdam.
The restoration method that was used: ‘Before cleaning the acrylic paint, each color is measured for acidity and conductivity. Good thing too, because in this acrylic painting it appears that every color has a different value. So we mix a different cleaning mixture for each color. That way we can safely remove dirt for 46 years. ”…“ Before we start, we assess the results of our cleaning tests under the Dino-lite microscope at 60x and 200x magnification and compare them with the photo taken before the treatment. We use both the cleaning sets from The Modular Cleaning Program and from the CAPS workshop.‘
microscopic examination of ‘people eating’
Marjan de Visser has had lessons in the use of these two related cleaning techniques that have been specially developed for acrylic paint. This method is the only option for the restoration of acrylic paint wall painting Lucebert in Erasmus University Rotterdam.
See the links to the workshops on acrylic paint cleaning The Modular Cleaning Program by Chris Strapleis and the CAPS workshop specially developed for acrylic paint paintings by The Getty Conservation Institute, the Tate Modern, and The Canadian Conservation Institute.
Acrylic paint is relatively a relatively young type of paint that was developed in America in the ’60s of the 20th century and also used by artists in the Netherlands in the late ’60s. Lucebert was there early. ‘And so do we, because by applying these cleaning techniques to this wall painting, we leave behind a healthy paint surface after conservation.’
