Preserving the matte. Evaluation of selected adhesives and fillers for a conservation treatment on a gouache painting by Gino De Dominicis

When it comes to contemporary paintings, degradation processes often occur in a very short time. The execution technique can lead to an extremely rapid deterioration, which begins in the early years of their life, usually requiring a prompt intervention. A conservation treatment becomes highly challenging in the case of matte paint, due to its sensitivity to morphological and optical changes. This effect is even more noticeable on gouache paints, as their high pigment volume produces a light-scattering, resulting in a strong matte finish. Additionally, gouache paint layers often start to flake producing the so-called “mud cracking”. When thick layers overlap, the solvent can evaporate through the exposed surface only. As a result, a rigid and fragile film is formed on the surface, while the underlying layers maintain a certain degree of humidity. These differences cause significant tensions, resulting in flakes with the typical “cup-shape”. The extreme sensitivity of the gouache painting Con Titolo can be addressed to two main causes: the widespread “mud cracking” and the micro-fragmentation of the figurative area, in some regions resulting in color gaps (fig. 1). The brittleness condition did not allow the artwork to be placed upright. Eventually, the absence of a protective coating makes the artwork even more sensitive to non-desired modifications of the matte surface. Hence, a conservation treatment and a protection system were needed to fix the detached paint layers while maintaining their peculiar matte finish. At the end of the intervention, the painting could finally be exposed and correctly conserved.