Restoring 19th Century Portrait of Harriet Nicholls - filling and retouching - Episode 5

Hi everybody, welcome along. This is the episode you've all been waiting for I think. We're going to finish Harriet today. We're going to do some of those second pass cleans, we're going to be filling, we're going to be retouching and just getting ready to go really. So thanks everyone for being along for this journey. Hopefully this is the episode where I get the sound correct. You can see my nice sparkly new lapel microphone, let's hope that works. I've been looking into my decibels on YouTube and hopefully I will get this audio right for you guys. Anyway, let's get started with Harriet. Let's go. So from last week, here you can see I did the second pass on the bonnet and there's not much residue left. Here's a close-up of the varnish that I'm trying to get rid of. You can see how it's still forming there. This is after cleaning so you can see how those dark sections are kind of removing. So the varnish is still on in certain areas so I'm going to just have a look at places like the hair and I'm just going to see how much I can remove. So checking the swab as usual, making sure there's nothing on there that shouldn't be and I can see highlights in those in curls in the hair and that's really what I'm trying to expose now. I'm trying to get the rest of that dry kind of greeny brown residue off and then show the highlights and the detail that he's captured in the hair. So I'm just going now you can see some really nice detail in those curls and highlights and almost individual hair so I'm really pleased with how that looks. I just wanted to show you this now. So here is after the cleaning has dried and these dark kind of grey brown dry patches are still varnish that are left on the painting. So they're areas that I still need to tackle and remove. I'll just show a little bit how I'm going to do that. So here's the section that I've been looking at. I can see some dry residue around it, around her hand. So what I want to do is just put that under UV light and when the UV light goes on you'll still be able to see the varnish that's present. So I'll just bring that in now. So there you can see that green fluorescent area is still varnish that I haven't removed. I've removed it around the clock. You can see that I did that previously but I still need to tackle this whole area here and get that gone. And there's a little bit around the fingers as well, around the base of her hand as well. So I will just show you what that looks like when I start removing that. So I'm just going to turn this off in a second and you'll be able to see what it looks like without the UV light on. So as you can see there's still varnish coming off there. I'm just checking my swab and it's the same colour that's been consistent across the whole painting. So I'm just working across that area. I don't know if you can see there in that brown area there's still some small fragments of cotton wool. Some of you were asking how I know when to stop cleaning. So as I'm cleaning this I can feel that it's still sticky and there's a bit of drag on the cotton bud and these little fibres show me that there's still varnish present in there. So I need to carry on working to remove those and get them off the painting. But you can just see there as I work over that the small fibres do disappear and you're left with just the paint surface. And sometimes it's a bit about feel and how it actually feels in your fingertips and visually as well just to make sure you're removing what you need to. So we're on the second pass clean here now and this area here at the bottom I've got sections that look like historical overpaints that have darkened over time. If you look at these brush strokes the dress is coming down and then these strokes are going across and kind of scrumbled. They just don't seem to be going the same way. This one again this whole area here is dark and looks like there's a historical impact. And again this section here, this tone, this kind of raw umber tone, it seems to be going the wrong direction for that dress. So I have had a look at seeing if these will remove. You can see that impact area there. If I can't clean these off then these will have to be overpainted and it will just become part of the painting. Sometimes it's not worth trying to clean them too much. It can be a little bit aggressive. But again look here's the tone of the original artist's shadow coming through the dress and then this area is just scumbled and dark and doesn't seem to be really part of the actual painting. I have tried to clean this area a little bit but I don't want to go too aggressive and risk damaging the paint surface. And again here these strokes, these swooshes, even though they kind of complement some of the direction of the original painting, I don't think they're original. Okay so I did try and remove that section there but unfortunately the old oil paint has dried too much and it would be dangerous to try and aggressively remove those. So I'm just preparing the canvas now. I want to put a barrier varnish on. So this is like a, not a retouching varnish, but it's a layer, not as thick as a final varnish. I'll apply this all over the painting now. So for me this painting is in its original condition or as close as I can get it to its original condition. So this barrier varnish will go on the top and then any of my filling or any of my retouchings will not be on the original paint or historical paint. So this is something that I always do and it just protects the painting. It protects it going forward so that in the future if anyone wants to take off my restoration work they'll be able to get down to this barrier varnish layer and get back to what I deem to be the original paint or original historical paint. So I'm just applying that now by working it across the canvas, up and down, making sure that it kind filling all those tears and rips. I'll be using a conservation grade filler and I'll be just filling those areas, pushing it, pushing the filler into the gaps. I'm not concerned about any excess that's on either side of the tear. This is easy to remove after it's dried so I'm just working the filler across, getting it nice and level, filling that gap as best I can. And then once it's dry I'll be looking at removing the excess and just leaving the filler in the rip. As a restorer when you get a painting that's got a vertical tear or a horizontal tear, as straight as these, you're always kind of grown a little bit because they're so difficult to hide. If it's just a small tear or it's an irregular tear like that one on the right-hand side they're a little bit easier to fill and disguise but when it's so prominent and so straight it is really difficult to kind of push that back and avoid it spoiling the viewing of the picture. So it might take numerous passes with the filler to get it right but they are notoriously difficult to it off. I've got to let that dry a little bit and I'm going to remove the residue from the outside of the filled areas. It may need a second pass in case some of it's kind of dried out and sunk a little bit but I think it's time for a cup of tea now. So we'll have a little bit of a break then I'll come back and when we come back we will be looking at clearing that off and then we'll get ready for retouching which I'm looking forward to. Okay five minutes. So with a solution and another cotton swab I'm just going to remove that excess from the outside of that tear, just carefully making sure not to go over the filled area and leave the filler in place while just rotating You can see how that filler just sits nicely in the tear not over the edges and it's ready for me to start getting ready to retouch. Now when you retouch sometimes when you put pigment on you get to see how good that fill is and whether you need to apply some more but at this stage they look good I'm happy with how they've turned out. Okay so she's been filled now and all the excess filler has been removed, taken that all off. I'm just going to let that filler settle a little bit and I'll probably look a little bit closer into that filled area to make sure it's nice and level and if there's any texture that needs to go over the top I'll use a medium to paint that over so that it matches any brush strokes but to be fair the the paint layer is quite thin so I don't think I'll need to add too much texture if any at all but yeah so next time you see Harriet she will be on the easel and we will be retouching. So here I'm retouching this vertical tear you can't see my palette but I'm making little mixes every time that hand goes away just in in the tear area matching those tones maybe making them a little bit darker because when the final varnish goes on it will darken the surrounding paint but yeah small adjustments tiny little dots of paint and just working my way up methodically to matching the surrounding paint area. This was just me adding some mineral spirits so when I add some mineral spirits to the outside of that tear I get to see what it will look like when the varnish layer is applied and it just gives me a little bit more of an indication of what colors are matching what I'm trying to achieve so again here a little bit of spirit there just shows me that true colors underneath that kind of blue excess filler and then I can match the colors better when I actually start quicker to match those colors and in your mind you realize what pigments you need and what colors you need and what colors the artist has used so sometimes I'll look what colors are actually on the painting and that helps me build my palette helps me choose what colors I'll have on there and then in my mind if I've got a good match of his palette or her palette all the colors on that painting can be achieved from the pigments that I put on there so it's just a matter of trial and error and just keep persevering and knowing that they have the same colors that you have and then just with constant mixing and adjusting you will find the exact color that you need so again just to reiterate at this stage it's just like a first pass so it's just like a ground layer cover over that filler get it as close as I can but knowing that it will dry and when that varnish is applied they will need adjusting so I'm just working methodically all the way across those tears now and applying the pigment and just trying to get a base cover and once that's dried I'll pull away and see how how it's looking so this large tail on the left hand side is a bit of a bind it's quite wide it's very very straight so I'm just going to match the colors as best I can using the colors around the tear as reference sometimes if I've got a color already mixed on my palette I can jump down like that blue and then it's a matter of joining the gaps looking at the color references either side of the tear and just doing small strokes to match that in on the first pass right so I've just in there I've just done the retouching the first pass retouch on Harriet matching those colors in there some some bits need to go over again I'll do another pass of those but what really concerned me was the line on her neck when you put the pigment in sometimes that you get to really see how good your fill is and that's not quite where it needs to be yet so I'm just going to refill that neck area take it back off again and then retouch again but yeah so I will show you what that looks like so as soon as I've started filling this now I can tell straight away it's a better it's a matching the tear on either side it's a little bit flat but that's okay so in this first pass I'll color in that area match those tones and then once that's dried I will be looking at matching the text the texture as well so this will be an initial coat and then once that's dried I'll be matching the texture of the cameras on top of that fill while that's drying I'm going to make another varnish now so this is a hydrocarbon varnish there's a solvent there's a resin and this is a modern varnish that's been tested and it's all reversible so I'm just going to the mixtures right now I always have to get my calculator out I always have to work out exactly how much I'm adding and you can see my reference for my new layer in the background so that this recipe is one that I've used quite a bit it's a little bit let's say more glossy than the barrier varnish so there's a little bit more resin that is added so once that's been put in there it'll dissolve naturally and it might take half an hour to an hour maybe a little bit longer to fully dissolve so once that's in there it'll start kind of merging with that solvent and then this is an additive that I'll put in so it's just a really small amount of this and this is just like something that you add to the varnish that will just stop it discoloring over time a lot of the old resin varnishes over time as you see the yellow and oxidize this little bit of a additive will just stop this one from yellowing so yeah I'm just going to gently put this in well it was supposed to be gentle but there you go it's in let's let that dissolve now and do what it needs to do I'll just tidy up a bit and I'll show but if you look closely you can see like little waveform ripples coming off those crystals and you can just see it moving across that solvent so once that's fully dissolved it will just be left a little bit longer and then I'll be getting ready to apply another coat of varnish this this isn't the final layer it will just show how those retouchings have sat on the painting it will also show me what texture I need to add so if some of the areas need a little bit of texture to match the surrounding pattern of the canvas that does come through to the paint layer this varnish layer will show me what that looks like and what needs to be done but she's looking good I'm pleased with I mean this view is not the best shot but you can actually see those colors coming through now that cloud in the background I have looked into our rain eagle and he was a great landscape painter as well so he probably spent quite a bit of time just getting that right but again the colors that he's got in this painting are fabulous and the whole composition is just so powerful and so strong but when this varnish goes on there you can actually see that you can see those colors coming through and um yeah she's looking good I might have to try and put the original photograph in here and what it looked like when it first arrived but yeah I'm really pleased with how she's looking so this varnish will go on now and I'll let it settle and then there now and I'm going to let that go off so she's had a lot of work done on her this week we have filled and restored and retouched some areas have had second passes some areas might need me to look at them again what I'll do once once I see this varnish has gone off and finished and dried I will then have another look at her and assess and see what needs to be done sometimes there's little bits where you've not quite got it just perfect or just right so they might need readdressing I thought I'd get her finished this episode unfortunately not I will be doing probably one more on her but we'll wrap everything up she'll be completely finished and ready to go back to the client so hopefully that'll be the next episode but it looks like a nice day out there no no it's fairly early I'm going to finish for today and don't forget to like and subscribe leave me a comment I always read through them and yeah I'll see you next time cheers guys thank you that sounds wrong doesn't it oh okay