Professional Development Workshops
The Conservation Center offers a variety of workshops in conservation technology and collections care that are open to conservators, artists, art historians, archivists, museum professionals, science professionals, and students. The full-day workshops range from one to five days in length and are usually held during the summer months. Classroom lectures are combined with hands-on laboratory practice to familiarize participants with current methodologies.
To place your name on the mailing list, please e-mail: conservation.workshops@nyu.edu
Admission to the Continuing Education Program
Space is limited and to ensure a spot in the workshop early application is recommended. Late applications will be accepted if space allows. Applicants are requested to submit statements on the applicability of their selected course(s) to their work, and brief resumés listing their relevant education and employment backgrounds. This allows workshop instructors to shape the seminars according to participants’ needs.
Financial Aid
Partial financial assistance is occasionally available for qualified applicants who would otherwise be unable to participate. Applicants submit written statements of financial need, and, where appropriate, letters from their organizations endorsing their requests.
Travel and Housing
Participants are responsible for their own travel, meals, and housing arrangements. Recommendations for moderately priced accommodations are included with acceptance packets.
SYMPOSIA IN CONSERVATION
The Kress Summer Teaching Institute in Technical Art History
July 25 - 29, 2011
What is a brush stroke? What can it tell us? What pigments and paint media did the “old masters” choose … and why? How can technical analysis help us to discover the process of creation, the relationships between artists and workshops, and the changes wrought on paintings over time?
As summarized by David Bomford, Acting Director, J. Paul Getty Museum, “technical art history concerns itself with all the processes for making art, and the technical and documentary means by which we throw light on those processes.”1
The Summer Teachers Institute in Technical Art History (STITAH), hosted by the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, in partnership with the University Art Gallery, Yale University, offered a unique professional development opportunity for professors of art history in colleges and universities who wished to enrich their own teaching with the insights gleaned through technical art history. The program was an overwhelming success. A total of 15 participants joined us, 13 art historians and 2 scientists, all from various teaching institutions across the U.S. and Canada. With lectures, gallery tours, conservation labs visits and more, the group enjoyed learning from experts who traveled from near (the Conservation Center and the Metropolitan Museum of Art) and far (National Gallery of Art, and the National Gallery, London). There was even a chance for everyone to get their hands dirty, with a practical workshop on Old Master Artists’ techniques led by Phoebe Dent Weil.
Applicant Pool
Full-time art history faculty (or art history faculty applying jointly with science faculty) at North American colleges and universities were eligible to apply. No background in science or conservation was required. Particular focus was paid to applicants who expressed a strong commitment to integrating technical art history into their own teaching curricula.
While this year’s program is closed, please keep your eyes peeled for information on the STITAH 2012, which is currently slated for presentation at Yale University in New Haven, CT.
Stipends and Fees
Thanks to the generous support of the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, participating faculty received fixed stipends of $1,000 for 5 days to help cover travel costs, local accommodations and living expenses for the duration of the program.
Thank you for your interest. Should you have any questions about the program, please contact:
Sarah Barack
Samuel H. Kress Fellow in Technical Art History
The Conservation Center
Institute of Fine Arts, New York University
14 East 78th Street
New York NY 10075
E-mail: sb340@nyu.edu
1 David Bomford, 2008 Forbes Prize Lecture, International Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works annual congress, London, 2008.
The Interface Between Field Archaeology and Conservation
February 7– 9, 2011
The discovery and excavation of archaeological sites and recovery of buried artifacts provides us with an opportunity to understand antiquity, but also leaves us with the important responsibility for preserving these ancient artifacts and their context. In this three-day workshop, held at the Intercontinental Hotel, Abu Dhabi and the NYU Abu Dhabi Institute, archaeologists, conservators, scientists, and museum administrators explore trends in research and training at the interface between field archaeology and conservation. The workshop will enhance the prospects for regional and international collaboration and effective communication amongst the engaged specialists. The workshop is structured to combine scientific talks, a lecture open to the public, field trips to museums and archaeological sites, and a round table discussion. Download Program [PDF]
Conservation Legacies of l’Alluvione.
A Symposium Commemorating the 40th Anniversary of the Florence Flood
November 10 – 11, 2006
On Friday, November 4, 1966, after a month of heavy rain, the Arno River overflowed its banks, flooding the city of Florence and causing incalculable damage to life, property, and cultural patrimony. Now known as “l’Alluvione,” the Florence Flood revolutionized the field of art restoration as no other single event.
The Conservation Center of the Institute of Fine Arts and Villa La Pietra, New York University, in cooperation with the Opificio delle Pietre Dure and Laboratori di Restauro Opere d’Arte, (Florence, Italy) hosted an international symposium to mark the 40th anniversary of the Florence Flood and its legacy on art conservation and international disaster response. Bringing together many of the surviving participants in the rescue effort—both the leaders and the so-called “mud angels” who were in the field—the two-day symposium was held at Villa La Pietra, NYU’s campus in Florence, and the Palazzo Vecchio. Mayor Leonardo Domenici of Florence, the late Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts, and the mayors of New Orleans, Dresden and Prague—cities which experienced significant flooding—were also present. Download Program [PDF]
Postprints available through Archetype Publishing.
Cesare Brandi and the Development of Modern Conservation Theory
October 4, 2006
Cesare Brandi (Siena 1906-1988) was the founder (in 1939) and the director of the Central Institute for Restoration in Rome for 20 years. In 1961 he moved on to teaching History of Art first at the University of Palermo, and then at Rome University, starting in 1967. He published more than 50 volumes and countless essays and articles on art criticism and history, aesthetics, art itineraries, and the protection of cultural heritage. Considering art as the supreme value in the life of any person and the history of humankind, Brandi’s activity was ceaselessly focused on identifying and studying artistic expression, wherever it could be found. His reflections emerged from the highest tradition of European thought, from Plato, Kant and Hegel, up to Husserl, Bergson, Arnheim, and Gadamer. This background – combined to an immediate and unique experience of art forms – allowed Brandi to formulate
one of the most original aesthetic theories of the twentieth century.
A day of research and study celebrating the life, achievements and legacy of Brandi was sponsored by the Italian Cultural Institute of New York, The Conservation Center of the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, and Associazione Giovanni Secco Suardo. Download Program [PDF]
The Conservation Needs of Photography Collections in Central Europe
June 21 – 23, 2006
A three-day symposium held at the New York University campus in Prague in association with the Academy of Fine Arts and Design, Bratislava. The Academy of Fine Arts and Design, Bratislava, SK recently established the Central European Institute of Art on Paper Conservation (CEIAP), which will offer training in photographic materials conservation.
