Conservation is a preventive process made on the support of the work of art. Canvas in the case of a painting, Wood or Metal, for sculptures. And paper on watercolor paintings. Etc.

The objective is to stabilize the art piece and stop or revert the natural damage or deterioration caused by negligence or accident. All process included in the preservation require high level techniques, knowledge and skills of different strategies  And understanding and sensibility for the work of art. Each one of the steps is a task and it requires perfection to enable complete success when a masterpiece is being rescued from damage.

Before the preservation of a masterpiece is done, It is required to make a report indicating the state of the work. A physical study most be done in order to establish the level of damage of the materials.

The restaurateur has many tools available, such as magnifying glasses and microscopes, special material  used to detect acid on paper;  UV lamps to

measure the level  of intervention on a painting; X-rays, to be able to observe inside of the work of art, and in the case of  wooden sculptures,  to detect the trace and tunnels made by parasites, or the metal elements in the internal structure.

On paintings, there are  many examples where one painting was made upon another. When the artist lacked material, they used the fabric over and over. The restaurateur then, uses applied photography. It permits to detect, with the correct light and length of exposition, traces of brushstrokes which are different from the painting on top, texture alterations where the expert may distinguish if there is another painting under that one. It also allows the detection of very thin cracks or lack of attachment between layers.

As a last resort, a chemical analysis  can be done. With the help of a restaurateur, the chemical expert will look for traces of an specific material used during certain time to determine the age of a piece of art, the possible original artist, etc. All these tools are very useful to the restaurateur to know as much as possible from the work of art so they can decide best procedure available considering the piece as one element but made of different parts.

We can say that conservation is use to stop the damage on a work of art. The correct understanding the way every material reacts against exterior natural agents and the proper preventive action to give the piece not juts the possibility to survive but also to continue being of use, as in a piece of furniture.

The next step is restoration. This is a process which complements conservation. We take the whole process to the next level. That is, once the piece has been treated to prevent further damage, we will take care of the finishing details, the aesthetical presence, where the power of communication is transmitted from a painting or sculpture. As a matter of fact, it is more common to talk about restoration of works of art, rather than everyday use objects, where its function is their original purpose.

In the case of works of art, we are talking about ideas or feelings, the artist I is capturing in the piece, whatever material or technique  he used, paper, fabric, wood, metal, clay, even a wall. The work of art itself, is expressing a visual message. Therefore, when this piece of art has been damaged, whether by accident or negligence, and the image or the idea has been broken, we may not be able to understand the first intended message. The restaurateur must have the ability and the sensibility to understand the intention of the artist. To be able to give back to the work of art its communicative power.

There is a discussion about if a restoration must “blend in” to facilitate understanding of a piece or “make evident” the work of restoration by means of applying  a neutral layer or lines on the borders of the restored area to allow the observer to recognize easily the original piece. This last technique has been frequently applied by museums.