Category: Art Conservation
Student Blog: Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
March 31, 2025 Written by Riley Thomas | Images by Katrina Wilson and Riley Thomas
For just over six months I have been a third-year graduate intern in objects conservation at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, Massachusetts under the supervision of Objects Conservator Jessica Chloros. Opened in 1903, the Gardner Museum was founded by its namesake, Isabella Stewart Gardner. Everything in the museum was curated and arranged by Isabella herself, making every part of the historic building, from its collections to its furnishings and architectural finishes, a work of art. Under the stipulations of Isabella’s will, everything is to remain as she arranged it “for the education and enjoyment of the public forever.”
I am thrilled to be at the Gardner this year because we are currently in the middle of the last full room, floor-to-ceiling restoration of the main galleries – the Dutch Room. Over the last 100+ years, small changes made to the galleries in the interest of preservation have added up to a room slightly different than Isabella intended. With these room restorations, we hope to restore Isabella’s vision as it was documented in archives and historic photographs.
As a part of this project, I just completed treatment on a pair of carved wooden reliefs that hang on either side of the fireplace in the Dutch Room. These reliefs were carved in walnut, painted, and gilded. They depict the biblical scenes of the Nativity and Resurrection and may have originally been a part of a larger carved panel or choir stalls before being cut out and sold as individual works of art. They date to approximately the late 1500s and are believed to be from southern Germany.
Isabella purchased them in 1897 from a dealer in Venice, Italy, where historic photographs show they already had significant damage from wood-boring pests. In addition, a layer of dust and grime obscured much of the gilding on the Nativity relief. My treatment consisted of reducing this layer of grime, consolidating friable areas of wood, and creating fills for losses in wood and gilding due to pest damage. Although I considered using a putty-like fill material for the losses, I eventually decided on a long-fibered mulberry paper toned with colored pencils and paint, both rolled up for individual pest holes and as an overlay for larger areas of loss.
I was introduced to the use of paper as a repair material in conservation during my second year as a WUDPAC student, so I was excited to apply it to a major treatment. As the repairs were aesthetic rather than structural, paper ended up being the perfect choice for both ease of application and reversibility. After a few small gilding fills consisting of gold leaf over an acrylic paint “bole” also on paper, my treatment was complete. Having not worked extensively with wooden or gilded objects before, this project was a welcome experience.
In the remaining months of my third year, I look forward to several more treatments that are giving me experience with new and exciting material. These include an enameled glass mosque lamp, a limestone angel statue, and assisting my colleagues with cleaning the painted ceiling of the Dutch Room in front of visitors, as well as continuing to assist with lab tours, gallery rounds, and exhibition changeovers in the contemporary wing of the museum.
— Riley Thomas, Winterthur/University of Delaware Program in Art Conservation Class of 2025
