CCI Newsletter, No. 35, June 2005

From the Desk of the Director General...

by Jeanne Inch, Director General and Chief Operating Officer, CCI

The longer I am at CCI, the more I am impressed by the depth and scope of the research and development program. As I see it, research and development represents the core of our mandate, a valuable activity on its own as well as the foundation of our other main activities: expert services to clients, and knowledge dissemination through training and publications.

CCI's conservation scientists and conservators perform a variety of research and development activities, all of which are focused on, and applicable to, the preservation and conservation of heritage collections as well as the effective treatment of specific objects of national or regional significance. We place particular importance on research that addresses conservation challenges faced by heritage institutions in Canada — research aimed at establishing and maintaining 'museum norms' within Canada's extreme climate, or focused on distinctive Canadian materials such as birch bark and other materials used in First Nations and Inuit objects.

The results of our research are clearly visible to the conservation community around the world, through our own publications, articles in peer-reviewed professional journals, and presentations at professional conferences. You will find many references in the bibliographic database of the Conservation Information Network (www.bcin.ca). Our research results also form the basis of our workshops for conservators, collections managers, and others working in heritage institutions, and they are the backbone of the advice we provide, whether it is treatment options or assessments of heritage facilities.

We take particular pride in responding to client needs and, in fact, consult regularly with the conservation community. Our ongoing research into the preservation of electronic media stems from annual consultations with the Canadian Council of Archives; some of these results can be found in Preservation of Electronic Records: New Knowledge and Decision-making, the postprints of a symposium that CCI co-hosted in 2003. Likewise our research into mould was initiated by consultations with the Canadian Association for Conservation; in this case one result was a Technical Bulletin (#26 Mould Prevention and Collection Recovery: Guidelines for Heritage Collections).

For more than 30 years, we have been committed to the principle of conservation scientists and conservators working together to find solutions to conservation problems. This multidisciplinary approach ensures that a conservation problem is seen from all perspectives: the analysis of heritage materials, treatment options, and display and storage advice following treatment. We also believe in working in partnership with other organizations that have common goals.

CCI performs four types of interrelated and mutually supportive research: supporting research, applied scientific research, treatment and methods development, and collections preservation research.

Supporting research, as the name implies, creates new knowledge and/or new techniques that act as building blocks for other types of research. This includes the study of materials to understand their chemical and physical properties, and the development or refinement of scientific methods that are required for applied scientific research. For example, the study of iron corrosion is a necessary precursor to finding ways to stabilize archaeological iron; the results of some of this research can be found in our recently published Metals and Corrosion: A Handbook for the Conservation Professional. Another example is the work we conducted on a shrinkage temperature technique to determine the condition of leather fibres — a technique that was put to use in our service work on the U.S. Declaration of Independence.

Most of our science laboratory research is applied scientific research, which is undertaken to answer specific conservation questions and to develop new knowledge, based on the accumulation and interpretation of scientific data. This new knowledge is used to evaluate and optimize approaches to treatment and techniques, and enhance the understanding and protection of collections. One example is the investigation of techniques and materials used by Canadian artists such as Jean-Paul Riopelle, David Milne, and Tom Thomson, which resulted in data that can assist in evaluating the conservation, storage, and display requirements of their work and in making decisions about preserving it. Another example is the research, undertaken in collaboration with the Canadian pulp and paper industry, on the permanence of paper that formed the basis for a new Canadian Standard for Permanent Paper.

Treatment and methods development leads to practical solutions to the challenges presented by conservation treatments or artifact preservation. The results of this research are of direct relevance to all conservators. Treatment development research may rely on supporting or applied scientific research, or may be a refinement of an existing technique. For example, one of our conservators recently collaborated with one of our conservation scientists to examine European research into iron gall ink in order to determine the best way to treat some of Canada's oldest documents; these findings were then shared with other conservators in Canada and the United States at a workshop on iron gall ink organized jointly with Library and Archives Canada. Also, research by one of our conservation scientists into local stain removal techniques for use on textile artifacts resulted in the development of a small suction disk, the actual usage of which was refined through several treatments by our conservators.

Our fourth area of research is focused on collections preservation. Often referred to as 'preventive conservation', this research is undertaken to improve decision making and cost-effective management of heritage collections so that deterioration is minimized. Collections preservation research often involves a synthesis of ideas and data from a variety of sources, for example, experts in fire prevention and security. Frequently the goal is to make the results of technical research accessible to non-specialists. One example is the framework we have developed for preserving museum collections that takes into account the severity and variability of the Canadian climate. Another example is the development of PadCAD, a cushion design software that was the result of many years of research into the transportation of artifacts and works of art.

Given the variety of issues in conservation and preservation, and the limited resources of CCI, determining research priorities and ensuring the research projects we undertake produce results useful to the heritage community is an ongoing challenge. For the work that CCI has done in meeting this challenge, I'd like to thank Charlie Costain, Associate Director General of CCI, as well as his team of conservation scientists and conservators.