Conservation: Morses Experimental Technique (in Samuel F. B. Morses Gallery of the Louvre”)

When Samuel F. B. Morse’s painting “Gallery of the Louvre” underwent an extensive conservation treatment in 2010, independent conservators Lance Mayer and Gay Meyers found that certain pictures in the painting, such as Claude Lorrain’s “Sunset at the Harbor,” had been over-cleaned and poorly retouched by former conservators. Actually, Morse’s technique was partially to blame. In this video, Lance Mayer shows viewers how his treatment ameliorated or reversed some of these alterations, restoring clarity to affected areas of Morse’s composition.