Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry
Organic/Inorganic/Materials Seminar

Karen Trentelman, Getty Conservation Institute
June 6, 2025 • 3:00 pm, WIL 110
Hosted by CBGReAT

Art as Evidence: The technical study and scientific examination of works of art

The scientific study of works of art addresses questions related to conservation (material identification, degradation processes, compatibility of treatment methods), curatorial (artist’s technique, workshop practice, attribution/provenance), or material (physical properties and behavior) issues. Answering these questions frequently requires detailed analyses of cultural heritage materials and the reconstruction of historic technologies. The precious nature of works of art creates unique analytical challenges, often necessitating the development of new analytical approaches or specialized instrumentation. A premium is placed on those techniques that either can be used completely non-invasively (i.e., without the removal of any sample, such as X-ray fluorescence and Raman spectroscopies), or can provide new and vital information with the removal of only minimal amounts of material (such as trace analysis via inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) or chemical state information via X-ray absorption near edge spectroscopy (XANES)). Underlying all the work is the common goal of furthering the understanding of the materials and methods used in the creation, interpretation and conservation of works of art.
This talk will present examples of research focused on objects in the collection of the J. Paul Getty Museum, ranging from Egyptian mummies to medieval manuscripts, to Italian gilded panel paintings, to 19th century French drawings, to paintings by Rembrandt and Van Gogh.