Tours
October 7, 1999
Barry, Chief Conservator, and Isabelle Tokumaru, Associate Conservator at the Kimbell Art Museum (KAM) provided us with a guided tour of the Conservation Department. We viewed facilities, equipment, work-in- process, and before and after photographs showing us the breadth of their work. Claire Barry is a graduate of the Art Conservation program at Cooperstown; she came to the KAM in 1985 after working at the Metropolitan Museum. Isabelle Tokumaru graduated from the Art Conservation program at NYU, and joined the KAM in 1995 after an internship at the Met.
Since 1992 the Conservation Department at the KAM has been shared with the Amon Carter Museum (ACM). The conservators assess the condition of new acquisitions and items to be exhibited, recommending conservation needs. The emphasis of the Department is on restoration of new acquisitions and establishing conservation priorities. The department also handles disaster planning and pest management for the entire museum. Only paintings are conserved in the KAM lab. Ideally, in the future, the ACM will set up a shared paper conservation lab. The Dallas Museum of Art has a good objects conservation department and is able to take on work for the KAM and ACM. Besides working on KAM and ACM paintings, the conservators take on work from other cultural district museums or private owners, giving them the opportunity to tackle special challenges.
Louis I. Kahn, the building's architect, understood the conservators' needs for natural light and designed the conservation lab with northern windows (northern light being the most constant). The Conservation Department houses a reference library in their staff room. With facilities located near curatorial offices, conservation functions are well integrated into Curatorial Department operations. The museum photographer handles the Conservation Department's documentary photography from a studio adjacent to the lab. Archival files and conservation photos are housed in the Registrar's Office, with curatorial files.
Conservators are able to handle technical research on paintings, using an infra-red reflectogram, X-radiograph, and auto-radiograph. Scanners and Adobe Photoshop are used to compare the radiographs, super-imposing images to look for changes. Curators have used these images to date paintings, understand an artist's technique, or confirm attributions. Researchers may request appointments to use this equipment for special studies and conservators are willing to provide condition assessments and advice to the public.
Janine J. HenriDocent Sylvia Urlage gave us a guided tour of the permanent collections exhibited in the KAM galleries. Louis I. Kahn, the building's architect, devised galleries so that walls can be hung almost anywhere in the building, providing exhibit designers with maximum flexibility. The arched roofs ("shell" or "post-tensioned" roofs) with screened sky-lights provide diffused natural light with which to view the works. The floors, of light colored oak and travertine create a subtle flow of light and dark.
We viewed works more or less in chronological order, starting with the Asian Collections (which include Gandharan, Mathuran, Cambodian and T'ang stone sculpture, Thai and Chola bronzes), then Ancient Collections (Cycladic, Greek and Roman sculpture), ending with European paintings (medieval altarpieces, Italian Renaissance paintings on wood panels or canvas, Northern Renaissance oils on canvas or silvered copper, Baroque, Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century paintings, as well as some early Twentieth Century works). Artists such as Giovanni Bellini, Fra Angelico, Titian, Caravaggio, Georges De La Tour, Rubens, Rembrandt, Boucher, Joshua Reynolds, Goya, Canaletto, Vigée Le Brun, Corot, Gaugin, Cézanne, Munch, Picasso, Matisse, Monet and Mondrian are represented. The docent provided much insight into the history of collecting at the KAM as well as provenance details for some of the pieces.
Janine J. HenriTour
October 9, 1999
ARLIS/Texas-Mexico members were treated to an in-depth tour of downtown Fort Worth by Susie Pritchett, a knowledgeable Fort Worth historian and advocate of historic preservation. Before beginning the walking tour, the group toured the new Bass Performance Hall, a splendid addition to downtown Fort Worth's cultural life designed by David M. Schwarz. The building's design is Beaux-Arts inspired, but many of its features help imbue it with a Texas identity, including building materials native to Texas and murals from Fort Worth-based painters Scott and Stuart Gentling. The group continued its tour with Susie through the downtown area, where at every turn members learned of Fort Worth's rich history and its inextricable link to downtown architecture. The tour ended with a delicious luncheon at Reata, which is located atop the Bank One building in the central downtown area. From that vantage, members had an encompassing, bird's eye view of many of the buildings seen at street level.
Sam Duncan