Buenos Aires to the rescue
Denis Williams’ Human World
Denis Williams’ Human World

–Argentina helping with major art restoration project

By Neil Marks

Argentina’s Ambassador to Guyana, Luis Martino, gestures during a press brief at his residence, July 7, 2016. (Samuel Maugh photo)
Argentina’s Ambassador to Guyana, Luis Martino, gestures during a press brief at his residence, July 7, 2016. (Samuel Maugh photo)

HUMAN World, perhaps the most iconic work of art produced by a Guyanese, was put on show from May 11 for an exhibition to mark Guyana’s 50th Independence Anniversary.
The Dennis Williams painting (152 x 132 cm), representing the exodus of Caribbean people to London and the industrial world that engulfed them, was repatriated from England, and gave birth to the national collection in the 1950s.
For the two-and-a-half months it was part of the Golden Jubilee exhibition, titled “From Colony to Nation”, the untrained eye might not have picked up that there was something wrong with the state of Human World.

But the masterpiece, revered as the only work of art in the Caribbean to make it on the cover of TIME magazine, is in urgent need of repair. And it’s not the only one! Some 55 other artwork and paintings in the National Collection are in dire need of restoration as well!
“One painting, ‘Bird Island’ – which won the national award, and which I have always boasted about – is cracked up! So cracked up, it’s worse than Haiti!” shrieked the artist, Bernadette Persaud back in May, 2014.
FAMILIAR STORY
Phillip Gajadar, Deputy Chairman of the Board of Directors of the National Art Gallery, is familiar with the horror story of the national collection. In 2014, he assessed the collection and found that there were 27 works of art which needed urgent attention. Since then, 29 other pieces were added to the priority list for restoration.
“A great deal of the deterioration in the organic materials comes from insects, mold and micro-organisms,” he stated in a “condition report” sent to Dr Frank Anthony, then Minister of Culture, Youth and Sport.

In an interview with the Sunday Chronicle recently, Gajadar said the deterioration came about due to “sheer neglect.” For example, there is a particular worm which burrows through wood, and leaves what locals call “granny sugar.”
“If you have a piece of wood and you notice ‘granny sugar’,” he said, “then you can deal with it right away; it would take years for the entire stretcher to be eaten away. So, if the collection had been closely monitored, then it would not have been in this state today.”
Gajadar, a reputable artist himself, does not profess to be a conservator, but with the training and experience he has, he has been used to do some amount of restoration.

POOR STORAGE
He said that “very, very” poor storage exposed the collection to an environment that caused the damage.
“It is true we don’t have the knowledge and the expertise, but continuous monitoring and simple housekeeping,” he said, “could have done a lot.”
The collection is stored at Castellani House, a colonial heritage building now 133 years old, which was renamed after its Maltese architect, César Castelanni in 1993, and designated the National Art Gallery.
Ohene Koama, Curator (ag) of the Gallery, in a recent interview, pointed out that before the Gallery was established, the artworks were moved from place to place, until they came to be housed in the three storage rooms on the upper flat of the main building of Castellani House.
He said that when Gajadar examined approximately 200 pieces from those rooms back in 2014, several types of damage were noted, from surface cracking/flaking, brittle corners, termite eaten edges to broken and chipped edges, and even punctures.

Now, the Department of Culture of the Ministry of Education has solicited the help of the Argentinian government in the restoration of the artworks, noting that some of the pieces are “endangered”.
“Unfortunately, Guyana does not at this time possess the necessary technical competence to combat the infestation,” said Dr James Rose, Director of Culture, in a project proposal dated March 16, 2015, and seen by the Sunday Chronicle.
“The DOC (Department of Culture) is seeking to source necessary technical competence through some form of bilateral arrangement with Argentina,” Dr Rose said in the proposal. That bilateral arrangement is still being worked out.

SOON COME
When Argentina’s Ambassador to Guyana, Luis Martino, hosted the local media at his house on July 07 last, he said that a group of experts in the restoration of artworks are soon to come to Guyana to proceed on the “long road” to “restore and bring back to life” the national collection.
Being frank, he said the question of the restoration of artwork is “no easy thing” and the “restoration of a masterpiece can take months, depending on the damage of each.”
But the Argentinian government is actively pursuing Guyana’s request to decide on the best team to send. They are looking at Guyana’s submission, and would first have to make an assessment on the ground to determine the amount of work to be done.

“Our underlying vision here is that we are talking about the heritage of a nation; to put back so many pieces to life (would be difficult) but we will accomplish the project,” the Ambassador stated.
The Argentine authorities are in discussion with Universidad Nacional de San Martín (UNSAM), which recently restored damaged artworks before they were returned to Ecuador.
According to Ambassador Martino, it is not definite that a team from UNSAM will be used for the Guyana arts restoration project, or whether another team will be chosen. “We are waiting,” he stated.

EAGER TO START
The Ministry of Education is eager for the project to get underway. “Art is a critical component of our national tangible cultural heritage and it helps to both form and reinforce our national identity,” said Ruel Johnson, cultural policy adviser to the Minister of Education.
Speaking to the Sunday Chronicle, he said that the national art collection captures how “complex, rich and diverse our identity is.”

The move to secure an international partner for the art restoration project is critical, he said, as the country needs all the partners it can get “to see how best we could strategise, particularly on cultural heritage perseveration, which is expensive, and for which we don’t have the expertise to perpetuate.”
Human World and other works in the national collection are no longer on show, the exhibition having ended, and would be placed back in storage. Hopefully, the Argentines would come in time to save them from further deterioration, so that what they represent could be preserved.

“The artworks make it clear that our visual thinkers have been major contributors to the shaping of Guyana, proposing and given expression to values and ideas which help to direct and shape our development,” said Alim Hosein, Chairman of the Board of Castellani House in his introduction to the “From Colony to Nation” exhibition.
“In many instances, they were ahead of our politicians in understanding who we are and where we should be directing our energies.”

 

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