Thread-Counting Workshop Overview
Investigating art images with digital technologiesAn interdisciplinary team will present a half day Tutorial Workshop on the automated study of canvas weave from x-rays on Monday, September 21, 2009 at the Courtauld Institute of Art. Workshop participants will receive user training for a newly-developed software tool that produces and archives accurate local (or spot) thread counts from x-rays of paintings on plain weave canvas. We will demonstrate tool use to create weave maps that provide overall mappings of canvas weave density variations across a painting support.
The tool also provides thread angle maps that measure and record weave distortions such as cusping from stretching. Together, these different types of information can help match up pieces of canvas cut from the same bolt of primed canvas, or to identify later additions and mutilations to canvas painting supports, for example. The Van Gogh case studies presented will illustrate how use of the new tool, when compared with traditional hand thread count methods, can lead to more advanced findings.
Wild Roses, Vincent van Gogh
Participation:
Attendance is limited to 30 persons on a first-come, first-serve basis. The registration fee of £8.00 is to be paid in cash on the day, and covers the cost of break refreshments, a CD compilation with the software tool and instruction manual, plus a paper copy of same. Registration waived for staff and students from the Courtauld and the Hamilton-Kerr Institute conservation training programmes.
