Abstract
Portable icons, i.e. religious paintings on wooden supports/panels, have been continuously produced in the area of Greece from the first Christian centuries to the present time. The icons are covered by one or more layers of varnish which is originally applied in order to protect the underlying painting from various deterioration factors (such as wear) and to improve the appearance of the artifact. However, in the course of time varnishes gradually decay through processes that impart color and other changes. Therefore, the removal of decayed varnishes—an intervention called “cleaning” in the context of artworks conservation—is often required. In this work we examine whether the old varnish layers affect the results of X-ray fluorescence (XRF) analysis, an analytical technique that is widely used for the identification of pigments and other painting materials. For this purpose, selected areas of various post-Byzantine icons are analyzed by portable XRF before and after cleaning interventions and the relevant XRF spectra are subject to comparison. For the purpose of better understanding the varnish effect, old (i.e. eighteenth-nineteenth century) varnish recipes are also considered. The results demonstrate that the varnishes may affect significantly the obtained XRF spectra and, hence, certain conclusions as regards painting materials.
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Notes
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Note that in this region peaks of three important (in the framework of paintings XRF analysis) elements may appear, namely the Μα peaks of Au and Pb along with the Kα peak of S (Fig. 6b).
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Acknowledgements
This work was financially supported by the project “Center for research, Quality analysis of cultural heritage materials and communication of science” (MIS 5047233) which is implemented under the Action “Reinforcement of the Research and Innovation Infrastructure”, funded by the Operational Programme “Competitiveness, Entrepreneurship and Innovation” (NSRF 2014-2020) and co-financed by Greece and the European Union (European Regional Development Fund). Special thanks are due to Dr. Y. Bassiakos and Dr. E. Filippaki from INN, NCSR Demokritos for providing access to an XRF spectrometer. Also, father Dimitrios Kanellos is warmly thanked for allowing access to a late 19th century icon. Finally, thanks are due to the Greek State Scholarship Foundation (IKY) for providing a post-doctoral fellowship to G. P. M. for the study of primary technical Greek sources/painting manuals (contract number: 2019-050-0503-18729).
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Mastrotheodoros, G.P., Anagnostopoulos, D.F., Beltsios, K.G. (2024). Cleaning Old Icons: The Effect of Varnishes on the XRF Analysis of Portable Panel Paintings. In: Osman, A., Moropoulou, A., Lampropoulos, K. (eds) Advanced Nondestructive and Structural Techniques for Diagnosis, Redesign and Health Monitoring for the Preservation of Cultural Heritage. TMM 2023. Springer Proceedings in Materials, vol 33. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-42239-3_11
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