Abstract
The Evolution triptych by Piet Mondrian (1911, oil on canvas, Gemeentemuseum Den Haag) presents a case study of a painting that is seriously affected by zinc soap formation, which has resulted in paint delamination and paint loss, particularly in the cadmium yellow paint areas. The paint is extremely fragile, which makes the paintings vulnerable with regard to handling and treatment. This paper focuses on the analytical research of the painting using various state-of-the-art and novel macro- and micro-imaging techniques. Macro X-ray fluorescence scanning (MA-XRF) revealed the presence of cadmium (Cd) and zinc (Zn) in the affected yellow paints. Paint cross sections of both affected and intact paint areas were investigated using light microscopy, scanning electron microscopy coupled with energy dispersive X-ray analysis (SEM-EDX), attenuated total reflection Fourier transform infrared (ATR-FTIR) micro-imaging, and synchrotron photoluminescence (PL) micro-imaging. With the help of these techniques, the cadmium yellow pigment could be identified as a mixture of cadmium sulfide and cadmium oxalate. The presence of zinc white was established in areas where the yellow paint film is degraded, while the intact areas of yellow paint do not contain any zinc white. In samples of the degraded paints, it was demonstrated that high concentrations of zinc soaps have formed, accumulating at interfaces. This has caused local chemical and physical changes of the paint resulting in delamination between paint layers.
Keywords
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsNotes
- 1.
LM and SEM-EDX were done prior to ATR-FTIR and PL micro-imaging. When re-polishing the sample to remove the 3 nm-thick gold coating applied for the SEM-EDX analysis, the surface was slightly modified. This explains why the images obtained with the different analytical techniques cannot be 100% overlayed.
- 2.
During sampling, the thick paint broke into two halves, which were embedded separately. The sample containing the lower part of the layer structure was also analyzed, but the images are not shown here since those layers do not show any sign of degradation and appear stable.
- 3.
In sample X5, which was taken from turquoise blue paint that showed some wrinkling (Table 21.1), zinc soap formation is visible at the interface between an underlying, zinc white-containing green-blue paint layer and a cadmium yellow paint layer. However, possibly due to its thickness, the turquoise blue top paint layer appears to have prevented the paint from developing more serious degradation phenomena and lifting off, at least for the time being. Due to length restrictions of this paper, sample X5 is not further discussed here.
References
Alfeld M, Janssens K (2015) Strategies for processing mega-pixel X-ray fluorescence hyperspectral data: a case study on a version of Caravaggio’s painting Supper at Emmaus. J Anal At Spectrom 30:777–789. https://doi.org/10.1039/c4ja00387j
Alfeld M, Janssens K, Dik J, de Nolf W, Van der Snickt G (2011) Optimization of mobile scanning macro-XRF systems for the in situ investigation of historical paintings. J Anal At Spectrom 26:899–909. https://doi.org/10.1039/C0JA00257G
Alfeld M, Vaz Pedroso J, Van Eikema Hommes M, Van der Snickt G, Tauber G, Blaas J, Haschke M, Erler K, Dik J, Janssens K (2013) A mobile instrument for in situ scanning macro-XRF investigation of historical paintings. J Anal At Spectrom 28:760–767. https://doi.org/10.1039/c3ja30341a
Bertrand L, Réfrégiers M, Berrie B, Échard J-P, Thoury M (2013) A multiscalar photoluminescence approach to discriminate among semiconducting historical zinc white pigments. Analyst 138:4463–4469. https://doi.org/10.1039/c3an36874b
Fiedler I, Bayard MA (1986) Cadmium yellows, oranges and reds. In: Feller RL (ed) Artists’ pigments: a handbook of their history and characteristics. Cambridge University Press, National Gallery of Art, Washington, pp 65–108
Giuliani A, Jamme F, Rouam V, Wien F, Giorgetta J-L, Lagarde B, Chubar O, Bac S, Yao I, Rey S, Herbeux C, Marlats JL, Zerbib D, Polack F, Réfrégiers M (2009) DISCO: a low-energy multipurpose beamline at synchrotron SOLEIL. J Synchrotron Radiat 16:835–841
Helwig K, Poulin J, Corbeil M-C, Moffatt E, Duguay D (2014) Conservation issues in several twentieth-century Canadian oil paintings: the role of zinc carboxylate reaction products. In: Issues in contemporary oil paint. Springer, Switzerland, pp 167–184
Hermans JJ, Keune K, Van Loon A, Stols-Witlox M, Corkery R, Iedema P (2014) The synthesis of new types of lead and zinc soaps: a source of information for the study of oil paint degradation. In Bridgland J (ed) ICOM committee for conservation 17th triennial conference preprints, Melbourne, 15–19 Sept 2014, pp 1604–1612
Kolkena L (2014) A phenomenological atlas of degradation of cadmium yellow paint in paintings by Piet Mondrian (1872–1944) and some of his contemporaries, Master Thesis University of Amsterdam
Mass J, Sedlmair J, Schmidt Patterson C, Carson D, Buckley B, Hirschmugl C (2013) SR-FTIR imaging of the altered cadmium sulfide yellow paints in Henri Matisse’s Le Bonheur de vivre (1905–6) – examination of visually distinct degradation regions. Analyst 138:6032–6043. https://doi.org/10.1039/c3an00892d
Osmond G (2019) Zinc soaps: an overview of zinc oxide reactivity and consequences of soap formation in oil-based paintings. In: Casadio F, Keune K, Noble P, Van Loon A, Hendriks E, Centeno S, Osmond G (eds) Metal soaps in art: conservation and research. Springer, Cham, pp 25–43
Osmond G, Boon JJ, Puskar L, Drennan J (2012) Metal stearate distributions in modern artists’ oil paints: surface and cross-sectional investigation of reference paint films using conventional and synchrotron infrared microspectroscopy. Appl Spectrosc 66(10):1136–1144
Raven L, Bisschoff M, Leeuwestein M, Geldof M, Hermans JJ, Stols-Witlox M, Keune K (2019) Delamination due to zinc soap formation in an oil painting by Piet Mondrian (1872–1944). In: Casadio F, Keune K, Noble P, Van Loon A, Hendriks E, Centeno S, Osmond G (eds) Metal soaps in art: conservation and research. Springer, Cham, pp 345–357
Rogala D, Lake S, Maines C, Mecklenburg M (2010) Condition problems related to zinc oxide underlayers: examination of selected abstract expressionist paintings from the collection of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution. J Am Inst Conserv 49:96–113
Thoury M, Delaney JK, de la Rie ER, Palmer M, Morales K, Krueger J (2011) Near-infrared luminescence of cadmium pigments: in situ identification and mapping in paintings. Appl Spec 68(5):939–951
Thoury M, Van Loon A, Keune K, Réfrégiers M, Hermans JJ, Berrie BH (2019) Photoluminescence micro-imaging sheds new light on the development of metal soaps in oil paintings. In: Casadio F, Keune K, Noble P, Van Loon A, Hendriks E, Centeno S, Osmond G (eds) Metal soaps in art: conservation and research. Springer, Cham, pp 213–226
Van der Snickt G, Dik D, Cotte M, Janssens K, Jaroszewicz J, De Nolf W, Groenewegen J, van der Loeff L (2009) Characterization of a degraded cadmium yellow (CdS) pigment in an oil painting by means of synchrotron radiation based X-ray techniques. Anal Chem 81(7):2600–2610. https://doi.org/10.1021/ac802518z
Van der Snickt G, Janssens J, Dik J, De Nolf W, Vanmeert F, Jaroszewicz J, Cotte M, Falkenberg G, van der Loeff L (2012) Combined use of synchrotron radiation based micro-X-ray fluorescence, micro-X-ray diffraction, micro-X-ray absorption near-edge, and micro-Fourier transform infrared spectroscopies for revealing an alternative degradation pathway of the pigment cadmium yellow in a painting by van Gogh. Anal Chem 84(23):10221–10228. https://doi.org/10.1021/ac3015627
Van Loon A, Keune K, Boon JJ (2005) Improving the surface quality of paint cross-sections for imaging analytical studies with specular reflection FTIR and static-SIMS. In: Proceedings of Art’05 conference on non-destructive testing and microanalysis for the diagnostics and conservation of the cultural and environmental heritage, Lecce, 15–19 May 2005 (CD-ROM)
Acknowledgments
This research is part of the Paint Alterations in Time project (PAinT), which is financially supported by the Science4Arts Programme of the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO). The synchrotron photoluminescence experiments were carried out at the DISCO beamline, at Synchrotron SOLEIL, with the help of Matthieu Réfrégiers. Macro-XRF scanning was made possible with the support from the Baillet-Latour fund. We would also like to thank Prof. Joris Dik, Delft University of Technology, for making the Bruker M6 scanner available.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding authors
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2019 Crown
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Van Loon, A. et al. (2019). Paint Delamination as a Result of Zinc Soap Formation in an Early Mondrian Painting. In: Casadio, F., et al. Metal Soaps in Art. Cultural Heritage Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-90617-1_21
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-90617-1_21
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-90616-4
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-90617-1
eBook Packages: Chemistry and Materials ScienceChemistry and Material Science (R0)