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Materials Used in the Chinese Textiles from the National Museum of Art of Romania
by Ileana Cretu and Mihai I. A. Lupu
This paper presents concisely the results of the microchemical analyses made on Chinese embroideries and costumes, dated 18th –19th century, from the collections of the National Museum of Art of Romania, conserved in the last 40 years.
We consider this important for the conservation domain because information about the Chinese original textiles techniques is difficult to find (the Chinese websites are restricted). The references regarding the k’o-ssu technique indicate only the general materials without details regarding the genuine technology. Chinese textiles, historically well known, raise many problems due to the materials they are made of: very fine dyed or undyed silk, adhesive of unknown nature, paper metallic threads of different qualities, a different way of weaving and pigments used for decoration of tissues. These kind of items were sometimes decorated with pigments used without a protective coating. This caused important damages: the decorations depicted with blue, brown or violet pigments were lost together with the tissue. The most interesting technique is the imitation of metallic thread using paper, red ochre (bolus similar with that used for Byzantine icons), metallic sheet and varnish. Because of this technique, which includes paper and a binding material - both of them degradable by water - it is not possible to hydrate them by immersion or wet cleaning. This type of thread was used even in Europe during the 16th century for not very expensive textiles: "the Cyprus thread". Is there any connection between them? How big was the importance of the Silk Road during eastern European history?
By comparison with similar European materials, Chinese ones indicate a different behaviour which requires different conservation techniques. Acknowledging this, we chose different methods of conservation in order to achieve the best intervention possible.
Introduction
The National Museum of Art of Romania (MNAR) has a very interesting collection of Extreme Oriental Art. A number of 12 textiles, Chinese and Japanese costumes and embroideries from the 17th-19th century have been conserved. The oldest of them is a Chinese embroidery made with gold gilded threads twisted on silk (Table 1 - No. 8). The biggest Chinese embroidery from the MNAR collection dates from 1823 and it was made for a Buddhist Temple using red silk for the ground and gold gilded threads of silk (Table 1 - No. 11, image 1). 19th -20th century costumes are made in k’o-ssu technique, some of them embroidered and some others painted (Table 1 - No. 3). The Extreme Oriental textiles came to Romania starting with the 18th century, brought by Armenian merchants, and became part of private collections, some of them being used like garments or decorative objects. The conservation - restoration of this particular kind of objects raises problems because of the lack of information regarding their original technique and materials. Results and Discussion: Table 1 shows the similarities between the type and quality of the materials used in both costumes and embroideries. a. The silk ground and the k’o-ssu technique are made only with silk; after the 19th century satin was also used for the embroideries. b. The specific metallic thread used for decoration was made using gold varnished sheet, set on red bolus (red ochre), probably with the help of an unknown adhesive on paper, generally twisted on silk or cotton. The paper may have up to 3 layers and the bolus is very thin, similar with the one used for icons. The gold sheet has different qualities and thicknesses. The pigments and dyes could not be identified by microchemical analysis. c. These gold gilded threads are used for imperial symbols - the dragons, which are embroidered or weaved. In the first case, the threads are fixed using a very fine uncolored silk. d. Unknown dyes were used for the silk threads. Table 1. Similarities between the type and quality of the materials used in both costumes and embroideries; Image 1. Chinese Embroidery, 1823 (inventory no. 247/23377). The biggest embroidery from the MNAR collection, made for a Buddhist Temple using red silk for the ground and gold gilded threads of silk; Image 2. Imperial Ceremonial costume, MNAR, China, 19th century (inventory no. 47/ 22560). Simple weaving and pigments used for decoration (Table 1 – No. 3); Image 3. Imperial Ceremonial costume, MNAR, China, 19th century (inventory no.47/22560).Simple weaving, diagonal strips with metallic paper threads, gold and bolus-red ochre. (Table 1-No.3).
Costumes and Embroidery particularities:
a. The costumes have three different kind of metallic threads: the first one for decoration, the second for diagonal strips of the k’o-ssu technique and the third for the sleeves and the collar. The last one is made in the same technique, but it is twisted on a 1-2 mm thick paper instead of a silk core. Thus, it is less resistant. b. The sleeves and the diagonal strips are made using a metallic thread on paper, very well twisted, which has the role to keep the warps inclined to 45 degrees, corresponding to the Chinese typical k’o-ssu technique. c. The embroideries have only one kind of gold gilded thread, twisted on silk core. Embroidery No. 8 (Table 1) is also made with silk twisted on cellulose material, probably cotton. d. The costumes are made using extremely fine, well twisted silk for the warps and thinner wefts. These are almost untwisted and not very well pressed on the warps, to keep the same general aspect of the tissue when the metallic thread is inserted. The warps and the wefts could be dyed in the same colour or not. Sometimes, only the weft is brown, blue, red or yellow. e. The embroideries have the warps and the wefts dyed in the same colour, usually red or they preserve their natural colour. f. The adhesive used for fixing the linen of one costume (Table 1 - No. 3) is starch.
g. There were three different adhesives used for the embroidery No. 11 (Table 1). These are products of unknown origin and insoluble in water.
The original techniques and materials, together with the repairs, are responsible for the typical deteriorations:
- The loss of textile materials because of black, brown, blue or violet pigments painted directly on the fibbers; - The k’o-ssu technique where the warp is inclined to 45 degrees and different kind of materials used for wefts - silk and gold gilded threads on paper; - The fines of the silk thread which fixes the metal thread; - The use of synthetic dyes since the beginning of the 19th century, extremely unstable and dangerous for the silk (Table 1 - No. 11); - The former adhesives used in previous interventions. Other kind of degradations occurred due to the inadequate use, exposure and preservation: - The textile items brought to Europe were used for different purposes than the original ones. - The ceremonial costumes were made for one day use. - The huge embroideries were re-expose for very long time, vertically, after their repair. References 1. James C. Y. Watt and Anne E. Wardwell, "When Silk Was Gold: Central Asia and Chinese Textiles", Metropolitan Museum of Art New York, 1997 2. Philippa Scott, "Il libro della seta", Thames & Hudson, London, 1993 3. Ileana Z. Balta and Ileana Cretu, "Scientific investigation of metal threads from Romanian medieval embroideries", ICOM–CC METAL 2001, Proc. Intern. Conf. on metals conservation, Santiago de Chile 2001, Western Australian Museum, Perth. 4. M. Braun–Ronsdorf, "Les tissues d’or et d’argent du moyen âge à l’époque moderne", Cahiers CIBA 3: 2-16, 1961. 5. Vannoccio Biringuccio, "The Pirotechnia of Vannoccio Biringuccio: The Classic Sixteenth Century Treatise on Metals and Metallurgy", Dover Publications, New York, 1990. About the authors:
Ileana Cretu
Contact: adileana@yahoo.com Ileana Cretu is an expert conservator at the National Museum of Art (MNAR) from Bucharest, where she has been working since 27 years. She is specialized in the conservation-restoration of Byzantine metallic embroideries. She is also lecturer at the Conservation Specialisation Center of the Ministry of Culture and Cults since 1993. She is involved in the research of textiles conservation, collaborating with scientists in projects presented in several conferences such as NATCC 2000 and NATCC 2002, ART 2005 and TECHNART 2007. Moreover, at the present she is preparing her PhD thesis with the subject "History of the repair of embroideries in Byzantine technique from Romania". Mihai I. A. Lupu Contact: lupu@art.museum.ro Mihai Lupu is a conservator scientist at the Conservation Department of National Museum of Art (MNAR) from Bucharest. He has continuously worked in the conservation field since 32 years, performing research and acquiring experience in different materials such as metals, graphic documents, painting, mural painting and textiles. He collaborated on the analysis and conservation of the mural paintings from Agapia Monastery and several other painted monuments from Romania. The results of his research were published and presented at national and international conferences among which ART 1999, 2002 and 2005, Triennal ICOM-CC meetings in 1987, 1993 and 1996, METAL 1995 and 1998, etc. He was also member of the Artistic Components Commission, Ministry of Culture and Cults from Romania. National Museum of Art of Romania Calea Victoriei 49-53, Bucharest, Romania
www.mnar.arts.ro
Phone: 0040-21-313 30 30; Fax: 0040-21-312 72 25
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