Birgit Reissland

Rijksdienst voor Cultureel Erfgoed · Rijkserfgoedlaboratorium - Cultural Heritage Laboratory

A study of black pigments available to Burgundan Illuminators revealed an astonishing abundance of materials at hand...

A Practical Guide to the Production of Black Pigments & the Preparation of Black Watercolours, 1350-1700 lists 50 black pigments, quoted in historic recipes, with their cultural-historic background and manufacture. This digital guide includes hands-on reconstruction manuals and tables to easily find a specific recipe of a black pigment and explains...

Natural Red Chalk as Drawing Material to Italian Renaissance Artists: Red Chalk properties, Antique red-chalk sticks, 15th century - Red chalk as a tool for craftsmen and clerks, Late 15th and early 16th century - Introduction of red chalk to the arts in Italy, Early porte crayons, Map of 16th century historic mining sites of red chalk, conclusions...

The appraisal of the design and the weaving structure of Islamic knotted-pile carpets can tell plenty about the context in which they were produced, and the identification of signs of deterioration can help to establish their condition. These are often somewhat imprecise and laborious examinations, especially when considering carpets of large dimen...

This project report is part of a large project on natural red chalk as artist material carried out at the Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands and partners between 2018-2020. In order to answer the question where red-chalk crayons of specific artists once came from it is necessary to determine potential historic mining sites. Printed sources...

Since the Renaissance, artists have been drawing with red natural chalk. Not as powdery as red earth, but softer than haematite, natural red chalk has a specific cohesion that allows to draw lines without scratching the paper surface. The cause of this specific cohesion remains unclear. This part of the "Natural Red Chalk" research project explores...

This report covers the initial part of a large project on red chalk as historic drawing material, carried out at the Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands (RCE) and partners from 2018 - 2020 (RCE 2018-118-a-e). It discusses natural red chalk in the context of related materials such as iron ores, red earths and red ochres as well as fabricated...

This project is part of a larger project on red chalk as drawing material for artists, carried out at the Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands and partners between 2018-2020.

The National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design (National Museum, Oslo, Norway), owns about 750 drawings by Thomas Fearnley, a Norwegian romantic landscape painter. Examination of 190 pencil drawings by Fearnley enabled the identification of the drawing materials he carried on his extensive journeys through Europe. Watermark analysis confirmed...

Within a research project focusing on the dramatic colour changes in Van Gogh's pen-and-ink drawings, interpretation of the analytical results requires a thorough understanding of late 19th-century ink manufacturing. Our laboratory had the unique opportunity to acquire a set of 90 historic ink bottles still containing ink. In this study, their chem...

The conservation of manuscripts and paper-based objects containing iron gall ink raises specific problems, even when the paper is in good condition. Iron gall inks are sensitive to water and some restoration treatments involving water cause small migrations of ink around the line. These brown halos, generally very subtle, are often acceptable. Howe...

Review of William Lewis study of different charcoales in the 'Çommercium Philosophico-Technicum; or the philosophical commerce of arts', London, 1763-65.

Ink corrosion prognosis by computer simulation, a novel tool to support conservation treatment decisions

Local mending of ink-corroded areas with a water-based adhesive bears one serious risk: too much moisture transports invisible, detrimental compounds like iron(II)ions and acids out of the ink lines into surrounding paper areas, spreading ink corrosion. Several common mending techniques are compared, the least detrimental was further developed to a...

Introduction: In 2003, discolouration of a large-format contemporary artwork on paper was treated locally with hydrogen peroxide in a private paper conservation studio in The Netherlands. 1 The treatment result was considered to be satisfactory. Unexpectedly, three months later, a huge number of tiny brown spots emerged in the paper (Fig 1). These...

The photofading of crystal violet (CV), one of the earliest synthetic dyes and an ink component, is examined on different paper substrates (in the presence and absence of gum arabic as an example of ink additive) via HPLC-PDA, fiber optic reflectance spectroscopy (FORS), Xenotest and microfadometer. The paper substrates chosen were pure cellulose p...

Iron gall ink, also referred to as iron gallotannate ink, is one of the most important inks in the history of western civilisation, and was in widespread use from the middle ages until the 20th century. Unfortunately, iron ions and acids present in these inks induce enhanced degradation of paper, thus severely damaging numerous historical artefacts...

Iron gall ink, also referred to as iron gallotannate ink, is one of the most important inks in the history of western civilisation, and was in widespread use from the middle ages until the 20th century. Unfortunately, iron ions and acids present in these inks induce enhanced degradation of paper, thus severely damaging numerous historical artefacts...

From the 15 th to the 19 th century, blotting sand was directly applied by the author on fresh ink in order to decrease its drying time. Blotting sand often is considered a disturbing material and therefore is regularly removed. However, in how far blotting sand should be considered as relevant source of information has not yet been verified. 30 ma...

A framework for the quantitative estimation of the risks associated with possible courses of action for the conservation of iron-gall ink-containing paper objects has been developed. It includes the identification of all possible undesired effects resulting from each course of action, followed by the estimation of the probability that a given undes...

Drawings and writings composed with iron gall inks frequently undergo colour changes which range from shifts in hue to extreme fading. Artificial ageing tests were carried out on 10 reference iron gall inks of different iron sulphate/gallic acid ratios applied on two different types of paper. Each ink application was subjected to the following thre...

Les professionnels de la conservation du papier ne savent toujours pas avec certitude quel est le traitement a appliquer aux objets en papier corrodes par l'encre. Ceci est probablement du tant aux resultats insatisfaisants obtenus par les traitements appliques jusqu'a present qu'au fait que les processus chimiques de degradation sont compliques et...