Restoring a Severely Distorted 18th Century Painting - Part 3 - Dirt, Smoke & Aged Varnish

As things stand now everything surrounding this registration has been focused on establishing the Dillad if you understand don't hinder or make it difficult for him to carry it out repeatedly Today this truth empowers us to begin the most effective way forward at process This is where we begin uncovering what's truly here e relationship to the artist the relationship to the time and what has been adjusted by centuries of grime smoke and decay In a moment like this there are no promises Some things will mprove some things may not and some surprises are inevitable This is the point where the painting begins to tell its own story I'm so excited to reach this moment with this piece and I know you'll all feel the same It's been a while since I last ran my tests so I've just remixed my The original solution and I'm simply returning to the painting to determine what we'll remove—right away you can see it's going to be quite dramatic That top layer of smoke— Brown nicotine staining rests atop multiple layers of varnish and these will be the first instances where we can truly see how dramatic the cleaning will be What I like to do is a number after different tests so this will be the second pass once the initial surface dirt has been removed I'll go over again to make sure there isn't a lot lef and then I’ll know how thick that layer is and this will be the third pass and you’ll see at there isn't really much to remove at all so that's my base layer which will be where the varnish layer will sit Once I'm satisfied with a quick mental image of where the I can begin to examine other areas once I've worked on the layers so I always start with the white pigments They're the strongest and then the second place I like to focus on is the forehead Again it's strong it contains white pigment it's typically thick paint and I know there's something in there There will be no damage when I enter that area and you can clearly see the thickness of the dirt that will be removed My main concerns however are these blistered raised areas over e crack layer At first I thought or hoped it might be in the varnish layer but upon closer inspection my worst fears have been confirmed—it's the paint surface that has blistered and wrinkled and you need to be extremely careful here because the paint surface is raised above the crack layer and isn't properly supported so you'll have to handle it gently when you look at it cleaning those blistered areas So here are my swabs from strongest first clean to second pass and then third pass— you can see the gradual improvement so I'm confident in my solution and ready to begin Okay everyone you can now see from revisiting those test areas that I have my a solution that will completely eliminate all the nicotine tar and smoke damage accumulated over 300 years surrounded by pipe smokers and over that fire it's thick—you can see how brown it is that's wha It looks like smoke or tar residue the kind of nicotine staining we refer to as such So this first pass We'll be removing that from the surface I'm going to start with the cravat area since it's white The pigments are the strongest and then I'll check inside his jacket to see what we can find there s wig and parts of his face as well So it's going to be like a little journey of discovery Here now that we've stabilized him we're finally going to see what's left of this a painting under 300 years old and it hasn't shifted at all in that time and it's thick so Let's get going It's so nice to see that first swab lifting away a larger section of this dirty surface and you can begin to see the brushstrokes emerge giving you a sense of what the artist is constructing while also revealing the layers and the complexity beneath of this painting including the varnish so even though I'm removing so much brown staining from this picture you can still see that there are recesses where dirt is trapped at varnish layer too so when I'm doing my second pass the swab's getting paler because it's receiving less and more of it is getting pulled into the center of the swab but I'm still seeing areas of dirt remain and that's when I know I've reached the varnish layer and it will be the same The solution I’m applying now into the wig—I’m not adjusting its strength I’m confident that all I’m removing is that dirty smoky tobacco-stained area on top and again the second The first pass removes less then the second pass removes even less and finally on the third pass nothing will come off at all it'll just be a very milky solution this looks like a drop of varnish that's on the painting so at some point in the past when it was varnished it dripped and pooled there at's something to keep in mind later so with the cravat finished and the part of the wig done I'm just going to take a quick look inside his coat so this area is where his coa and I can see some very thick impasto brushwork here—it's a little bit reminiscent of Nella It's quite thick so there'll be plenty there'll be ample paint on there—hopefully plenty of pigment too—and again the same solution going in on the first pass then tidying up up in the second pass which will reveal the varnish layer and what I'm dealing with as this painting progresses so at the moment it's not very promising—still looks very brown but that could Just that discolored baked-on varnish so yeah fingers crossed it brightens up considerably as you can see from these test shots this portrait is quite dark—I think it's the jacket you know It's going to be a dark brown though that might be off because there's also the varnish to remove but you can see I'm having to uncover layer after layer of this discolored smoke-darkened brown staining from the surface before I get anywhere to see exactly what we've got so I'm just going to now go over the painting slowly carefully and just start revealing those layers and carefully remove the entire painting down to the varnish layer—I'm being cautious to ensure I don' ake off too much but I also want to show what's underneath and what's left you know f it's been in a fire there might be other damage I'm unaware of or it might just be darkened over time perhaps the background will be dark and his jacket will be It's all a mystery to me right now—I'm completely in the dark and I still have no idea exactly what we're going to get With this portrait I think I'll just keep working on that surface keep it clean and then we'll see what happens appens once I've got that down to just one level across the entire painting so I'm using quite a large swab here to clean these areas and it's filling up very quickly so I'm having to change it frequently a lot to clean up but what I'm discovering is that even though it's so dark what's emerging beneath the wig there's still another thick layer of varnish perhaps two millimeters thick that I'm going I have to work on this part so it looks like I found the edge of his wig here so right around there is where his full bottom wig meets the background so this section here is where that happens e edge so this area here is all background which I'll leave for now—let's see if we can find At the top of his wig it's so thick—just look at it it's absolutely dark brown almost black I can see the wig is going to be much brighter underneath that varnish layer once we get down to that too but for now I'm just going to keep removing all this brown nicotine and tar staining eep struggling with that word because when I was taught we just called it nicotine staining but then a few people said well it's not nicotine—nicotine is colorless and it's tar deposits okay but I've always just called it nicotine staining because it's coming from cigarette smoke and tobacco smoke—maybe I should just call it tobacco staining instead It just covers me but this is looking good now—I can really see there's quite a lot of work in it s wig actually has quite a lot of nice flourishes of paint in it and it's quite eavily applied so it'll be interesting to see the precise color tone once we reach that layer Okay now that I've set the base tones for my wig and my layer and I've got the background layer Let's take a closer look at his face—just notice how smooth and even the paint is here especially on his forehead where the artist typically applies a thicker layer add more white to the skin tone so it's a bit stronger these areas can be a bit more pronounced delicate though it's faded into the wig but it still looks like there's discolored varnish o There too let's come down here—same solution I'll just gently remove around his eye see what— It's so thick that I'm just going to remove this swab—now you can see his eye revealing there and his face looks good—this is the first time this has been seen for a while It's been such a long time so it's truly special to finally reveal this—just think of the life this painting has lived for 300 years and for at least 150 of those it's looked like this—probably maybe not quite as bad so this is the first time we're actually seeing the sitter for the first time—just imagine all the historical moments this portrait has endured quietly deteriorating yet still bearing witness—just look a e eye I think he's got a kind face—he looks quite kind Let's keep going Let meet down to his Whether it's a stock or a cravat it's thick in places and some of it has become so encrusted that it's flaking off in small chunks Let's do a second pass there coming down from his forehead so you can immediately see how much paler it is as most of it has just accumulated The paint's pooling around his eye—imagine there's still quite a bit lingering there but where the paint has cracked and cupped through it's holding the tobacco staining in chunks and you can start to see elements of his eye emerging I wonder if there's a clue in there that will show us how to keep bringing this down to him lips and his chin as mentioned this is the first pass—you can see here that some of these little Thicker deposits are emerging from those cup cut areas I think we'll uncover even more once we begin removing the varnish layer and releasing those solvents but this is promising There are some lovely tones in there so I'm just hoping that as we remove these dirt layers and the varnish layers we truly uncover the artist's original intention—let's reveal it The side of his face—look at that it's just so thick it's unbelievable I've had some really old paintings were messy but this one is impossibly thick—this is the shaded side of his face where the light hits the other cheek so these tones will be darker Anyway I can see a glint in his eye that's gradually revealing I need to locate the edge of his face and then his nose will also have a shadow beneath it of course right there beneath his lips there will be a shaded area so that's what I'm aiming to achieve at this point The current goal is to level up that cleaned area so both sides are even—notice how I jus Touch this—it's mostly gone now but you'll find deeper stains in the recesses beneath his nose and it's still quite thick around his mouth where we've Not quite done yet and then it bites you—there's that brown color creeping back in so let's give that side a second pass you can really start to see a bit more of his character coming through He still seems shrouded in time doesn't he Still a little distant We'll see what unfolds when We start to look at that varnish layer—I'm really pleased with how he's turning out there are some lovely tones coming through and it's truly beginning to reveal itself as a painting now rather than just a dark mass almost like a solid wall of darkness we could see throug Yeah he looks good—let's just see what's happening with this wig and find the edge so it appears to be a genuine full-bottom wig which will assist in dating the portrait rying to situate it at the correct moment in history I've discussed wigs at length in the past when talking about other portraits So this will help me with dating—this gentleman must have had some money he's had his portrait painted and is wearing a very expensive full-bottomed wig which he's clearly very proud of So I wonder what his profession was or perhaps he was just a gentleman a man of means—hopefully when we get to his jacket there’ll be some clues maybe or if we find his hands or if he's holding anything but they might not be apparent in this size of portrait so once I've established the outline of this wig the background is just going to be pla To be one tone I suppose what I might do is just go down to his jacket now we'll do it first Pass and see if anything reveals the outline of his shoulder and jacket so I've just been cleaning this background area which is pretty uninteresting —removing dark brown from a dark brown background—but as you come around here I don't know if you can see that you're just getting the early signs of a fake oval as it was common at the time for many portraits to have an oval shape painted around the entire canvas and this seems to me like the start of one so I'll see what develops as we keep working on cleaning that area—while I'm handling his jacket or coat using the same large swab aga and I'm starting to see some texture brush strokes and hints of form emerging but it's still incredibly dark and these are the tricky parts to clean up When you begin cleaning paintings you want to see dramatic results—just like with the Venetian landscape we worked on a few weeks ago where the contrast is immediately obvious and you can clearly see what you're achieving removing and the nicely cleaned area underneath whereas with this and paintings like this cleaning is always much harder because it's much more difficult to see where you're working and what you're actually doing Removing them requires great caution—you must trust your approach and continuously verify your progress but yes these are the tricky ones for me especially dark images with low light backgrounds in dark tones and you just need to take your time and trust the process—so this section won't be very engaging for you right now but if something interesting comes up I'll let you know I'll show it to you soon but for now I'm just in the thick of it scrubbing brown off brown let's just keep going and see what shows up—I just wanted to show you this under UV light so where it's green is the varnish layer anywhere still brown is where nicotine remains on top so you can see as I move along the canvas I can just double-check to make sure tha all the nicotine is being released and I know this green layer is a varnish coating that we'll Tackle next right so this is how we locate him after the first pass clean—so this is with all that obacco residue discolored brown soot smoke—you can just about make out his cloak or coa You can see this simulated oval on the left side and his stop—there you can see his face and you You can see that stunning full-bottom wig too—it's quite impressive he still looks very monochromatic but there's also the varnish layer to remove so the next step will simply be to begin doing some additional tests again—that's my original one on his stock so I'll probably start cleaning that for varnish removal and we'll see what happens with that crackler too bu He looks great—there's so much more going on here than when we first started this image also has real depth and I'm just hoping some of the paint surface can still be saved because this painting has endured the trials of time yet he appears magnificent and here are the cotton buds used in the process—notice how the tone matches perfectly all that dreadful tobacco residue smoke residue and this pile stinks too—it’s absolutely disgusting so I’m throwing it in the bin and then— we'll begin with the varnish removal so my varnish removal solvent will attempt to strip that off A layer of varnish resting on top of the painting appears thicker in some areas than others so I've returned to my original formula—the small white belt that clean area there is wha I'm aiming for something that will take several passes and what I need to be careful about are those Raised blistered bubbled areas of paint surface—I don’t want to overclean them and remove the peaks so you can already see there’s quite a difference where I’ve taken that off but it's uneven with varying thicknesses and we have that crack alert to deal with so once again this will be a very cautious approach with this clean I'd just like to take this opportunity to welcome all my new patrons who joined since the last episode—it's great to have you along and thank you to everyone on YouTube who has liked commented and subscribed since last time please don't forget to like and subscribe—this video now it all helps and I'm rying to grow to 50 000 subscribers this year so please like and subscribe and also I'm Nearly 200 patrons—if you haven't checked out my Patreon I have tons of exclusive content there I have videos you won't see on the main channel and some giveaways too so head over now Take a look—I only need five more supporters for an exclusive Bloomfield Art Apron giveaway so here I'm just using my UV torch to remove that top layer of varnish making it extremely layer and then there's another varnish underneath but the area glowing green is where the varnish is applied and you can see a large drip here where they applied it rather loosely So I'll start by removing the thinner parts then go in more detail to address the thicker areas This method works wonderfully when removing a discolored varnish from a dark background or dark area of a painting where the tones are primarily brown and deep hues and our varnish is also brown and extremely discolored so the UV light just helps you identify exactly what you'removing Okay so you can see here where the varnish is green and fluorescing very brightly compared to the area I've cleaned where there are still a few small spots but it's somewhat uneven So this is what I'm dealing with right now—okay I hope you can see from that what I'm trying to convey o do that so the UV light reveals the green fluorescent varnish which is quite but when you're cleaning and painting in this dark space and there's still that tobacco staining we've removed most of it remains a dark background so you need to see where the varnish is The layer is there and sometimes you can tell by touch—you can feel the stickiness of the varnish coming off especially when it's thick you don't want to penetrate that paint layer too deeply so that UV light will Just show me where I need to remove that varnish so I'll just go across the background There he is revealing the stock's a lot brighter but there's so much to clean on this— and I'm only just starting to understand what's really going on with that paint surface entatively clean the background around his wig now and then we'll move on to his face which I'm You're all probably dying to see the results and so am I so let's just do a little more of this background then we'll move to his face and body—okay I'm just going to take a look at the First let me show you my solution so I can see what I'm working with then we'll take a look at this forehead—this is where the worst of the cracking and wrinkling occurs and the problem is that all those I was hoping those wrinkles were in the varnish layer but I think they're actually in the paint layer and those wrinkles are still trapping all that dirt which will block it Some of the solvent so I might need to go a bit more detailed in that area but you can already see the difference—it's much brighter where the solvent is adhering and attacking the paint surface not just the varnish layer—I might need to reconsider my approach for these parts here where It's a significant improvement here and here but these aspects concern me especially since it's quite deep deeply cupped because of the raised bubbled paint layer I don't want to remove the peaks since I'm Okay this is where I'm going to leave him for today—there's quite a bit of work involved here and the light started to fade so I'm probably about halfway through That background is clean but the wig still needs a lot of work on the face area once you get up close you can see that this crackler is holding a lot of dirt so I'm jus I'm going to think about how I'm going to approach this—I think that's probably the biggest wig I've ever seen on a painting but yeah considering where he started from and where he is today He looks much better so I'll come back in the morning and see how he's doing okay let 's continue with this clean It's the next morning now and I've just been experimenting with a different approach yesterday we began working on his face and a significant amount of this is accumulating in this area so I've adjusted my method and tested it on this wig and it appears to be making quite a difference so that's the dirty varnish right there—if you can see this area I've just cleaned you can now see some of those tones coming through along with some of those brush strokes so I think I'll continue down his wig and then we'll look at the delivery method for so when I was using the UV light the varnish was fluorescing that green color and then this varnish underneath is a second layer which is why I've adjusted my mixture as well because the first mixture wasn't having any effect on this varnish layer which is why remained present so with a slight adjustment I'm now getting down to the paint layer—beneath that heavily discolored brown varnish which is quite stubborn though I do believe there's an element of it that feels as though it's baked in but that doesn't help when it comes to those heavily cupped areas simply resist the cotton swab one technique to soften a particularly stubborn varnish is to use a compress—this involves a small piece of felt soaked in the cleaning solutio A little bit of melonex on top then I time it for 30 seconds a minute or two minutes and just make sure it's softening the varnish layer enough to lift it off sometimes this works and succeeds then you can gently use a soft brush to remove the varnis and lift it in this case it's softened just enough to let me roll over the top with a swab and remove some excess but there are still stubborn bits that won’ t budge and this only strengthens theory that it’s endured extreme temperatures at this varnish is deeply embedded in the paint's structure and I also have my new solution that's working well—so the same solution used on the wig is also proving effective effect on the face especially in areas that are smoother and less affected by heat but again in those wrinkled areas I'll need to use that compression technique as well Okay I think so ere comes a moment in nearly every painting restoration—when the work is in such a fragile state that you must step back and stop if I were performing CPR on a patient this would be the point where I’d pause someone would just pull you aside and say "Look I think you've done all you can do with this patient " and the more I work on this the more I'm trying to deliver something tha The more I realize the limitations of what we've been given to work with the less I feel it's truly there with so much of his face visible yes you can see so much more in his expression but that cracked fire-damaged paint—I think the only thing that could suggest such intense wrinkling is ense heat that has really puckered and wrinkled the skin altering its tone and texture and that's what's holding varnish and if I clean too deeply into that varnish I'll remove the tops of those peaks wrinkles I don't want to deal with but also when I'm using another method where you can see me Apply a solvent and under compression it softens somewhat—I've achieved good results on the cravat but in the face again it's softening things a little too much so I'm not saying I'm defeated I'm just saying I've realized where we stand in terms of wha This painting can reveal the cloak and body area again but there's no pigment there—perhaps it has faded over time or maybe it was hung somewhere and the entire pigment has deteriorated faded perhaps he used unstable pigments and they simply dissolved into nothing leaving behind only a faint trace with no real color—quite a disappointment and I must admit I'm disappointed because I thought we might uncover some underlying color but we've now reached the core of the painting here and we're preserving this image of this gentlema So my next step is simply to remove any remaining residue from this painting—any small areas of varnish I can find—and then we’ll apply a barrier spirit to prevent any further issues e cleansing effect of any solvents we've used and then we'll assess our current progress and what the next steps are with this painting—okay I've just put in another hour or so on e guy on the left side where you can see all these deeply wrinkled raised crackled areas s is the area that's hardest to clean and I think the heat whether it's from above or not makes it worse fire or in a fire this area is most affected and it's the hardest to clean I feel like this is the varnish is I don't know whether it's carbonized or stuck to the paint so firmly that you jus I can't remove it and I don't want to be too aggressive or go too deep but the sides where 's smoother cleaned quite nicely and was also easier to remove so I think that's where I'm going to leave that for today I think next week we'll come back and have another one assess but I think we'll be applying the barrier varnish and then retouching in the areas where ot necessarily any losses from damage to the right side—there are just a few small details here and there and anything on the face that's distracting rather than aggressively cleaning areas I might just add a few strategic touch-ups to balance him out but he's looking so muc He looks absolutely fabulous—I really like him he has a truly distinctive and appealing presence and it's obvious plenty of age so we'll come back next week and see if we can find a little bit more abou Who the artist is or even who the subject might be—okay guys I think that's where we'll leave it for in this episode it was quite an epic transformation from how it began to how he looks now and as mentioned there's so much going on with this portrait that I think there comes a point when you do have to realize that there's not much more that can be gained from cleaning a painting that's We've been in this condition so we'll come back next week and look at the barrier varnish retouching tidying up and we also have that frame to consider so there could be some framework is there as well so I hope you enjoyed that longer deeper dive episode—thank you to all Thank you all my patrons for supporting the channel—and thank you too fellow YouTubers because I can't even begin to express how much this means at thanks to all you YouTubers too for all your comments and support please don't forget to like and subscribe below—I'm aiming to reach 50 000 this year and your support would mean a lo To hit that target Manchester's weather is icy cold today and windy—brutally cold when that wind bites you—but it's nice and warm in here so from me and the Georgian we'll see you there Have a lovely weekend next time take care guys—see you soon bye