Dusting off the world of conservation studies

Students pass by the Fowler Museum at UCLA every day heading to class and often frequent the museum’s various art exhibits, but most have never ventured into the A-level of the Fowler, a place where the more hidden aspects of art work go on: those of art conservation.

Walk down one of these winding hallways and Professor David Scott might be lecturing. Whether teaching undergraduate science students about bronze casting or graduate conservation students about the management of art collections, Scott’s passion for art conservation shines through.

Scott wasn’t always interested in art conservation, however. He originally came from a science background, studying chemistry at the Institute of Archeology in London.

“I was a chemistry graduate who wasn’t really sure of what I wanted to do,” he said. “Like many people, I heard about conservation purely by chance.”

The idea of taking this less pursued route prompted him to earn a doctorate in conservation and begin teaching.

Scott’s main interest lies in the study of metals, with a strong interest in ancient technologies and more scientific aspects of conservation. His book, “Copper and Bronze in Art,” earned him the award for the most outstanding art/scholarly book published in the U.S. in 2002 from the American Association of Publishers.

“I’m still having a love affair with copper and bronze, but the topic of my next book is iron and steel,” Scott said.

After serving as head of the museum research laboratory for the J. Paul Getty Museum, Scott helped form the new conservation program at UCLA in 2003. The program is a joint venture for both UCLA and the Getty.

Since its inception, this conservation of archeological and ethnographic materials program has remained a lesser-known field, but one that nevertheless involves a multitude of disciplines.

“Conservation is a very wide-ranging subject,” Scott said. “It extends all the way to sites and monuments to modern-art installations to ethnographic basketry.”

Despite the program’s recent beginnings, the benefits of the partnership have already shone through.

“It’s probably the best circumstances for doing conservation research that you could possibly find,” Scott said. “Between the two institutions, the library research in particular is absolutely phenomenal.”

Most of the program’s activities occur both at the Fowler and off campus at the Getty Villa. Endowments grant graduate students the best of conservation equipment, with machines such as Fourier Transform Infrared Spectrometers and portable X-ray fluorescence machines to analyze the deterioration of artifacts.

Handheld machines of analysis are another important advancement which allow conservationists greater mobility.

“It’s a very useful development for us because we can take different kinds of instrumentation into the field or to museum collections abroad,” Scott said. “We may not be able to take objects out of the museum, but increasingly, we can now bring out machines to the museum.”

With these new advancements, conservation has grown in an area where that has not always been the case. Despite Los Angeles’ status as an epicenter for art, whether it’s outdoor murals and sculptures or any of the vast catalogues of indoor museums, the West Coast contains a startling low number of conservation programs, Scott said.

“There are very few courses like this around the whole of America, especially California,” he said. “We’re hoping that gradually our existence here will help strengthen the resources of the area.”

The program has already spread their conservation resources, with archeological and ethnographic materials graduate students aiding in the renovation of the Southwest Museum of the American Indian.

“Bit by bit our students are already having an effect locally with the conservation work they’re doing,” Scott said.

The Southwest Museum of the American Indian is currently being renovated. It’s a very old museum, dating from 1913, and needs remodeling and earthquake prevention, so the artifacts it holds must be packaged and moved out. The students are helping with that task. Also, to earn a spot in the master’s program, students must commit service hours to a local museum. Students in the graduate program also intern for a year at various local museums or archeological sites.

In spreading an interest in conservation, the archeological and ethnographic materials program delves into other departments as well. Scott taught Art History 103D, “Issues of Materials Preservation,” in the UCLA Department of Art History.

Scott’s Fiat Lux seminar, “Chemistry and Art,” currently being taught this quarter, introduces an even greater range of students to the concepts of conservation, with undergraduate students of all majors represented in the class.

From examining pigments, to using handheld machines at the Franklin D. Murphy Sculpture Garden, to studying the deterioration of murals, the course addresses a wide range of conservation components.

Zara Feeney, a first-year art student, looks at the class as a valuable introduction to a possible course of study.

“I wanted to learn more about art preservation because I’ve always thought about taking that route,” Feeney said.

For those students who do hold an interest in conservation, the archeological and ethnographic materials program offers a highly competitive master’s degree, accepting only about six applicants to their class every two years. This fall, another six applicants will be matriculating.

The three-year master’s program entails two years of coursework, with the third year culminating in an internship, and a master’s paper to finally earn the degree.

The first class of archaeological ethnographic materials students at UCLA will graduate in June 2008. The students will then choose from a number of possible paths in conservation.

“Some people want to go back to the East Coast; some might want to do some fieldwork or travel, and others might look around for a museum position,” Scott said. “They tend to all spread out since there is a whole host of possibilities. Geographically, conservators are not limited.”

With this first graduating class, Scott hopes to further weave the benefits of conservation into the fabric of not only UCLA but an international arena.

“For the moment, the program is just an infant, but as it matures and gathers strength, we’re looking forward to more collaboration and developments both across campus and out into the larger world,” he said.

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