International conferences

The Gabo Trust welcomes applications for grants from conservators of modern and contemporary sculpture to assist them in attending  ICOM-CC Triennial Conference: 14 - 18 September 2020 in China “Transcending Boundaries: Integrated Approaches to Conservation”.
The conference organisers aim to bring together conservation professionals from both East and West to exchange and discuss knowledge, traditions and skills in order to learn from each other’s practices, philosophies and materials. This will be the first time ICOM-CC goes to “zhōng guó”, 中国 (the Middle Country) for a  conference on conservation. 

(above: detail from chip filling workshop, attended by Brenda Keneghan 
© J. Paul Getty Trust.)

'Surfaces': FutureTalks019 in Munich, November 2019

The Gabo Trust grant aided Brenda Keneghan from the V&A and Myriam Lavoie, a freelance sculpture conservator from Quebec, to attend this conference.

Brenda Keneghan chaired a session on practical treatments of polymers. She acted as a mentor in the 'speed mentoring' event where attendees could spend 10 minutes with more experienced practitioners. She also attended a practical workshop on repairing scratches and chips on MMA surfaces.

Brenda reported that she found this FutureTalks conference the most informative to date, as much of the research into the treatment of modern materials (especially plastics) was presented, for the first time; and the dialogue between researchers and practitioners helped to hone research. She will endeavour to transmit what she has learnt to her colleagues, far and wide.

Myriam Lavoie, who specialises in conserving public art sculptures in a variety of media, also gained valuable insight and ideas at the conference. She was particularly interested in papers on photogrammetry, which can make a 3D digital map of a very large outdoor sculptural installation, as well as its original maquette. The two maps are overlaid and the result can be used to reproduce, as accurately as possible, a painted surface lost to weathering and successive repainting. 

Miriam intends to make her knowledge gained at FutureTalks019 as useful to as many conservators as possible, particularly her colleagues in Quebec. She is putting together a short document on the papers she heard, to share with them, and will apply to her own work what she learnt during the conference.