We’ve posted several entries about our Armenian scrolls lately and throughout, we talk about pigments. We’ve looked at them with X-ray flourescense, we’ve made some educated guesses by eye, and soon, we’ll be setting up a polarized light microscope to take yet another look in yet another way.
Just this morning, we had some visitors to the lab and, of course, they were taken in by the scrolls. One person asked if the illuminations were watercolor. This led to some conservatorial muttering between Kristen and myself, and reminded me that not everyone spends their days with XRF, egg tempera and isinglass. So, here’s a quick, fun, introduction to the world of pigments: http://www.webexhibits.org/pigments/
And, in “The Next Age of Discovery,” Andrea Alter for the Wall Street Journal explains how multi-spectral imaging, x-ray flourescence, and CAT scanning are being used in conservation. These techniques are becoming more affordable and usable, and provide tremendous opprtunties for the study and conservation assessment of artifacts.