Society of Winterthur Fellows

2010 Grant Recipients

Steven O'Banion, Art Conservation (2012)
SOWF funds financed Steven’s work experience at the Smithsonian American Art Museum’s Lunder Conservation Center during the summer of 2010. At the Lunder Conservation Center, Steven treated objects, practiced preventative conservation, and engaged in public outreach, the later of which involved speaking to tour groups and maintaining a blog about his work. Steven treated individual objects as well as those being prepared for upcoming exhibitions such as A Revolution in Wood: The Bresler Collection. This summer work experience will help Steven achieve his goal of becoming a museum conservator who specializes in conserving modern and contemporary objects.

Ellen Promise, Art Conservation (2012)
Ellen used her SOWF funding to finance her summer work experience at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. As a summer intern at the PMA, Ellen participated in day-to-day conservation tasks such as assessing incoming collection objects and helping with on site emergency conservation. The bulk of her summer work focused on conserving two objects: an eighteenth- century English smallsword and its scabbard and a pair of eighteenth-century ivory candlesticks. In addition to gaining invaluable work experience in a professional museum setting, Ellen also benefited from visiting many other cultural institutions in the Philadelphia region.

Erin A. Anderson, Art Conservation (2012)
After participating in a two-week archaeological field school in Italy, Anderson used her SOWF funding to visit museum and archaeological sites in Italy and Croatia. During this tour, Erin compared and contrasted site management and conservation practices to those she had encountered in the United States. In Croatia, Erin benefited from meeting with Sagita Mirjam Sunara, a faculty member in the Art Conservation Department at the University of Split. For Erin, this field study provided her with exposure to international archaeological conservation trends.

LeeAnn Barnes Gordon, Art Conservation (2011)
LeeAnn used her SOWF funding to finance her attendance at the International Council of Museums Committee for Conservation (ICOM-CC): Glass and Ceramics Conservation 2010, Interim Meeting, which was held at the Corning Museum of Glass in New York. LeeAnn attended talks covering a variety of topics. In one talk, presenters discussed re-creating historic glazes for ceramics and how these re-creations inform the conservation of corresponding historic objects. In addition to hearing talks by presenters from all over the world and to meeting these international leaders in glass and ceramics conservation, LeeAnn took in the comprehensive glass collections at Corning.

2009 Grant Recipients

Caroline Roberts, Art Conservation (2010)
Caroline completed her 2009 summer work project at the Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley where she participated in treating and otherwise preparing objects in the Hearst’s collections for loans to other institutions. Some of the objects with which she worked include a painted stucco mummy mask, glazed steatite scarab beads and faience amulets, and a sixth-century-BCE Corinthian vessel. As an intern at the Hearst, Caroline gained hands-on experience learning the differences between working with archaeological and ethnographic versus fine and decorative art.

Renee Wolcott, Art Conservation (2010)
Renee spent her spring break and the summer of 2009 under the auspices of Don Rash, a hand bookbinder and book restorer in Plains, Pennsylvania. While studying with Rash, Renee learned how to execute foundational tasks such as assembling simple book structures and selecting appropriate adhesives given the book conservation task at hand. Renee also learned how to execute decorative techniques such as Turkish marbling.

Sarah Elaine Kleiner, Art Conservation (2010)
Sarah attended the symposium "Facing the Challenges of Panel Paintings Conservation: Trends, Treatments and Training" in May 2009 at the Getty Center in Los Angeles, California. The symposium brought together international experts to discuss issues of panel painting including: conservation treatment (auxiliary supports), environmental monitoring, and an assessment of future training needs.  One of the highlights of the conference was a presentation on the conservation of Albrecht Dürer’s 1507 painting Adam and Eve at the Museo Nacional del Prado by George Bisacca of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Alisha Chipman, Art Conservation (2011)
As an intern in The Museum of Modern Art’s conservation department, Alisha gained experience treating a silver gelatin developed-out print of Carl Jung and captured by Henri Cartier-Bresson. In addition, Alisha conducted x-ray fluorescence spectroscopy (an analytical technique that identifies inorganic elements) on over 150 examples of fiber-based silver gelatin developed-out papers from the Paul Messier Historic Photographic Papers. Alisha’s sample set includes papers from a variety of companies produced between 1899 and 1994.

Lauren Bradley, Gwen Manthey, Emily MacDonald-Korth, Art Conservation (2011)
Lauren, Gwen, and Emily utilized their SOWF support to attend two conferences—“Studying Old Master Paintings—Technology and Practice” and the International Council of Museums, Committee for Conservation (ICOM-CC) Paintings Group conference—both held in London, England, during the summer of 2009. In addition to hearing lectures given by world-renowned conservation experts, Lauren, Gwen, and Emily made contacts that assisted with their current projects and facilitated their internship searches. For example, while chatting with colleagues at the “Studying Old Master Paintings” conference, Lauren and Emily gleaned critical information that assisted them in completing the construction of a panel support.

Kirsten E. Travers, Art Conservation (2011)
At the 2009 Traditional Building Conference, Kristen attended several lectures that are relevant to her interest in conserving architectural painted finishes. In addition to attending historical lectures such as “Three Centuries of Color,” Kristen also listened to lectures that addressed issues such as the Environmental Protection Agency’s guidelines and policies regarding lead paint removal.

Heather Hansen and Sarah Parks, American Material Culture (2010)
Heather and Sarah traveled to England in December 2009 to conduct textile industry archival research at various institutions for their MA theses.

2008 Grant Recipients

Alison Buchbinder, Early American Culture (2008)
While in the final stages of completing her thesis, “‘Through the Looking Glass’: Magical and Misused Objects in Nineteenth Century Children's Literature,” Alison attended the “American Play” conference at the Strong National Museum of Play in Rochester, New York in April 2008 where she presented “The Dangers of Solitary Play in 19th Century Children’s Literature,” a paper adapted from her thesis research.

Sharra Lenae Grow, Art Conservation (2010)
As an intern at the Lunder Conservation Center at the Smithsonian American Art Museum in the summer of 2008, Sharra executed a research and treatment project focus on surface efflorescence formation. After completing her research, she successfully removed surface efflorescence from two paintings: Still Life #12 by Tom Wesselmann, and Dreams No. 2 by Jacob Lawrence. Sharra completed these and other treatment tasks from behind the Lunder Conservation Center’s glass walls, an opportunity that allowed her to interact with the inquiring public.

Courtney L. Shimoda, Art Conservation (2008)
Courtney used her professional development funds to participate in a nine-day Hiromi Washi tour of Japanese paper-making sites with paper conservators Betty Fiske and Kiromi Katayama. The tour was organized to introduce paper conservators who train and practice outside of Japan to traditional Japanese paper, paper production, and paper uses. Understanding these practices and processes is critical, given the extent to which Western paper conservators use Japanese paper in their work. Sites on the tour route included the Kochi Paper Technology Center, which is one of four Japanese sites that works toward improving paper quality and use, and Kochi Prefecture, a region that produces the most hand- and machine-made paper in Japan.

Amber Lee Kerr-Allison, Art Conservation (2008)
Amber attended the Modular Cleaning Program (MCP) workshop at the Chicago Conservation Center (CCC), in Chicago, IL in March 2008.  This four day workshop was co-sponsored by the CCC and AIC, with instruction by Paintings Conservator Chris Stavroudis on the methodology and application of the MCP database for cleaning works of art.  Her experience at the workshop included an overview of the concepts and materials used in collaboration with the database program, incorporated exercises in formulating and preparing cleaning mixtures, and provided instruction for using the program to organize and record cleaning tests.  The collaborative structure of the workshop enabled Amber to work side-by-side with conservators from a broad range of specialties and career experiences in problem solving, considering ethical issues, and formulating treatment protocols for challenging cleaning projects.