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Caring for Collections

Conservation Principles

Conservation standards are set by international conservation principles and professional organisations, such as the Australian Institute for the Conservation of Cultural Material (AICCM). The AICCM’s ‘best practice’ standards include information on ‘preventative conservation’, the ‘10 agents of deterioration’ and ‘conservation treatments’.

Preventative conservation

Preventative conservation is the practice of safeguarding the items you have in your care against damage and deterioration, and planning the future safekeeping of the artworks. It begins the moment you accept an object into your collection. It is achieved by practising effective control of your building’s environment (both storage and display), and safe handling and display techniques.

Our considerations include:

  • Environmental control and monitoring: relative humidity, temperature, pest control, managing light and UV exposure
  • Safe storage: permanent and temporary
  • Disaster preparedness: floods and fire, and theft
  • Packing and transport

The 10 agents of deterioration

There are ten main risks to the change in artwork condition or damage: temperature, humidity, pests, light, fire, water, security, loss, physical forces, disassociation (data management).

For exhibitions, we work with a team to prepare gallery spaces with appropriate environmental and safety measures for art display (temperature, humidity, pests, light, fire, water, security/loss). For installation, we utilise mounts, cases, plinths for security (physical forces/loss). We also practise good record management (disassociation).

For both collections and exhibition displays, we aim for the condition of the work not to change through preventative measures. We record the work’s condition through a condition report and use appropriate handling, storage, installation and staff training to prevent changes in artwork condition while handling and installing artworks.

Condition Reports

A condition report documents the details of the work, and the location of any deterioration, damage or previous repairs. Photographs are an important accompaniment to condition reporting and should include close ups, all sides, and detailed records of any damage. To achieve this, condition reports and inventories are completed by the collection managers and conservators to ensure the artworks are recorded accurately before they are displayed. If damage is found, a conservator is consulted about treatment and repair.

Conservation treatments

If a work is damaged, we will assess the damage and ask a conservation lab to assist with repairing the artwork. Conservators work in conservation labs to clean, document, restore and repair artworks. The process to repair damage will vary depending on the condition and materiality of the work, as well as the artist’s intent. Conservators will prepare a lot of research on the artwork’s materials to plan the best approach before beginning a treatment. There are different types of conservators for different material specialities—most commonly: paper, paintings, objects, textiles, and frames/furniture. In recent years, time-based media conservators have become a new stream of conservation practice.

Permanent Storage

Artworks acquired into the University Art Collection are stored in dedicated artwork storage facilities that have climate-control, air locks and high security measures. Collection items are stored 18–21 Celsius with a relative humidity of 45–55%. Air locks are areas that protect the climate-controlled area from the external environment. High security measures include ensuring locations of collection storage are classified, entrance and sensory alarms, and limited staff access. Storage types include painting racks, floor storage for crates, large racking for medium sized objects, trolleys for small 2D works, and plan drawers for works on paper. The specific location of each stored item is kept on our collection management system, a process that ensures artworks can be found again. Collections use specific archival materials that are chemically ‘inert’ (definition: chemically inactive) when storing artworks. Objects are packed in a bespoke manner, with packing solutions designed for each object’s shapes, requirements and condition concerns.

Temporary Storage

Exhibitions at Buxton Contemporary often include artworks from the broader University Art Collection, other institutions, private lenders or directly from artists. We store these artworks temporarily on-site at the gallery in a purpose-built storage area, which has climate-control and high security measures. Works are often packed in bubble-wrap, archival materials, transit tubs, and specialty crates, depending on the method of travel to the gallery.

Transport

Collections Managers and Registrars oversee the freight of artworks for acquisition and exhibitions. While digital artworks can be sent via secure transfer services, specialised art freight logistic companies are contracted to help us collect and move physical works from all over the world to the gallery in a safe manner. Depending on the size and situation, we either use crates, stillages (structures used for separating artworks), or soft packing to move the works safely and protect it from damage.

Large works are often transported in parts by truck, plane and by sea, and must be reassembled once at the gallery. Sometimes, very specific transport methods are required for large works, such as specific truck types and handling equipment. In Collections, we consider the entire movement of the work from the moment it’s removed from its original location through to its final placement in the store/gallery. For extra-large works, such as Nadine Christensen’s yellow car sculpture titled Do We Go Around Houses or Do Houses Go Around Us (2021-2023), additional logistical planning is involved, including checking weights and measuring lifts, doorways, corridors and ceilings before we can confirm the trip is safe and possible.

Handling and installation

Specialist staff and equipment are used to transport and install artworks. Collection Managers and Registrars are responsible for assessing and mitigating possible risks to artworks and people when handling the artworks. Before moving artworks, they coordinate a plan to ensure the right number of trained staff are present and that risk mitigation strategies are implemented, such as planning walking routes without obstacles such as stairs, or using trolleys to move fragile objects.

Collections Managers oversee the installation process to ensure artworks are installed safely and that safe conditions don’t change. Collections staff also prepare condition reports before transportation and after receiving the works on-site at the gallery. Up to date condition reports are essential for insurance purposes.

Art handlers are trained to work with all types of artworks, and while some have specialties, they all aim to carefully move artwork from one place to another without causing damage. Art handlers require skills such as: communication and teamwork, focus, manual dexterity, spatial reasoning, and basic math skills.4

Depending on the object, Art Handlers utilise a variety of equipment to move, handle and install artworks, including: four-wheeled dolly trolley, pallet jacks, flatbed trolleys, A-frame trolleys, small-object carts, ladders, elevated work platforms (scissor lifts), levels, tape measures, hammers, screwdrivers, box cutters, pliers, socket wrenches, drills, gloves, and foam blocks.

Documentation for complex artworks

Collection Managers and Conservators, in combination with the Artist Questionnaire (see next page), create specific documentation for future displays of the artwork. These documents explain how the artwork should look, the requirements of the gallery space, what materials or technology would be needed for installation, how to complete an installation step-by-step and consider the future planning for the longterm care of the work.

These documents are referred to as:

Identity report: What is the work?

Installation manual: How is the work installed and what is required?

Iteration report: Specific to a unique presentation of the artwork. What happened, what worked, what changed?

Artistic intent and artist interviews

One of the many benefits of working with contemporary artists is that exhibition and collection teams are able to learn directly from the artist about their intentions for the display and care of their work. The best conservation outcomes are achieved when we work with artists directly and learn about their practice; it is our best method of documenting and preserving complex contemporary art for the future.

Collections Managers and Time-Based Media Conservators conduct thorough interviews with the artists to discuss the details of the work and its future care. During the interview process, the team documents the artist’s intent and plans for the work’s future displays, long term preservation and recording of the work’s concept. This is especially important when there are particular display methods and technologies, such as TV screens, projectors or exhibition furnitures.

The unique display requirements for Shaun Gladwell’s Maximus Swept out to Sea (Wattamolla) 2013, for nightshifts, provide an example of how artistic intent is carried forward for video works in exhibitions. This video work is displayed on a large temporary screen made of wood, covered in multiple layers of glitter paint. Gladwell’s instruction for this artwork is that the glitter should be so thick that it almost crumbles off the screen, to ensure the video projection glimmers and sparkles, an effect that can be seen reflected on the polished concrete of the gallery. Gladwell also stipulated the intended volume, and how the work should be lit for the exhibition.