Welcome to the online conservation treatment diary for Nicolas Poussin’s Crossing of the Red Sea. Over the course of this year-long treatment we will be presenting a series of informal updates designed to keep the public informed about the restoration of one of the NGV’s most prized paintings.
- Table of Contents
- An introduction to the project
- Map of treatment
- Getting Started
- Pentimenti
- Some changes in the painting
- Exodus 14
- X-raying the Poussin
- A strategy for cleaning
- The revelations of UV photography
- Previous restorations
- Crossing the Red Sea—literally!
- Removal of varnish and old retouchings
- Using copies to learn about lost information
- The rediscovery of a “lost” replica
- The mystery figure in the NGV Crossing of the Red Sea
- Fourteen months in seconds
Written by:
Carl Villis – Conservator of European paintings before 1800
Carl Villis has been a conservator of European Old Master paintings at the NGV since 1995. Alongside his primary focus on the restoration process, he likes to participate in interdisciplinary studies involving the technical and scientific analysis of paintings with traditional art history research to resolving unanswered questions about works of art.