Open House Success

A big thank you to everyone who was able to attend our Preservation Week Open House last Thursday!  It was a great success and we all had so much fun sharing what we do with everyone.  If you were not able to attend, we wanted to share the awesome comic that our very own Chris Voynovich (conservation technician) created just for the event.

ScrapbookOnePgWonder_CV_withInterior

Attendees were able to create their own one-page wonder featuring this comic and then had a chance to flip through the Madisonville Branch Library’s scrapbook that inspired the comic. Those who attended were also able to explore various artist book structures by viewing and handling (and in some cases, just admiring from a far) collection items from the DAAP Library’s artist book collection.  The evolution of the book was a central theme with attendees learning about pre-codex structures (like cuneiform tablets and scrolls), early codex structures (with a foray into medieval bindings and parchment), and modern structures like the ever complex scrapbook.  Attendees were able to stamp their own book mark, featuring a quote by P.J. O’Rourke, and learn about RTI, how the lab has improved their capture process, and view the results from a recent RTI project featuring cuneiform tablets.  And of course, attendees were able to grab a Busken cookie featuring our Preservation Lab logo.  It was a great event!

Make sure to mark your calendar for 2019 Preservation Week (April 21–27) so you can come down, visit the lab, and see the cool stuff we’re working on.  I’m also working on a little video of the event, so stayed tuned and check out our MediaSpace channel for updates in the near future.

Jessica Ebert (UCL) – Conservation Technician & Lead Photographic Documentation Tech

Preservation Week 2018 – be our guest!

It’s spring in Cincinnati, which means two things – the epic weather battle between winter and summer (snow yesterday, 71 degrees Fahrenheit tomorrow) and the annual Preservation Week Lab Open House!
This year marks the lab’s 7th year of participation in this national event, an American Libraries Association initiative aimed at raising “awareness of the role libraries and other cultural institutions play in providing ongoing preservation education and information.”  Our event is open to the public – come one, come all!
The Open House will include a behind the scenes tour of the lab, a peek at amazing collection items being preserved for our parent institutions – the Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County and the University of Cincinnati Libraries, and of course a new bookmark.

A walk down memory lane – bookmarks 2012-2017.


This year our theme highlights the versatility and artistry of the book, from a complex composite object such as a scrapbook to a simple one-page zine.  We’ll also touch on the evolution of the book form, from cuneiform to artist’s book.  As is our tradition, we’ll set up “stations” were visitors can roam, explore, and learn at their own pace.
We are looking forward to see you all on, Thursday, April 26th, 1:30-3:00 pm, 300 Langsam Library.  And yes, there will be cookies!
Holly Prochaska (UCL) —- Preservation Librarian
 
 

Pleasant surprise

I just want to take a moment to say – sometimes a little surprise can be so satisfying!
We’ve all been there, approaching a task where we see the beginning but not the end.
Well I’m here to tell you there is hope in the darkness. Occasionally delamination can be a real struggle. Sometimes you know what is underneath, sometimes you don’t.
But when you start the work, and occasionally you get a pleasant surprise.

 
 
 
 
 
 
Yay!  And now I think it’s going to be a good day!

 
Chris Voynovich (PLCH) —- Conservation Technician

The Preservation Lab…in the news

Check out this new article about the work of the Preservation Lab by our collaborator Melissa Norris, with assistance from Ashleigh Schieszer, Jessica Ebert, and Kevin Grace at https://libapps.libraries.uc.edu/source/preserving-taft/.
Isn’t Preservation just so cool!

Conserving a head sculpture.

Ashleigh Schieszer works on Taft’s maquette. (Photo credit Jessica Ebert)


And for our loyal followers a bonus image of the housing of the William Howard Taft letters…
Taft letters bound

Encapsulated binding by Chris Voynovich, design by Ashleigh Schieszer (photo credit Jessica Ebert)


 

For a good conversation call…

Yesterday we did some General Collections evaluation. This is when the Conservation Technicians get together to inspect the General Collections books that have been sent to us, and determine the best way to treat them. Since these materials circulate some of them are heavily used, and sometimes we find little surprises in them. This batch had a couple of especially fun ones. I found out that someone likes their vitamin gummies:

Then Jessica came across this unusual bookmark:

And then she was looking through this book about Nikola Tesla:

Complete with this invitation (number redacted for privacy):

I don’t know about you, but I think that sounds way better than, “for a good time call…”!
Veronica Sorcher (PLCH) – Conservation Technician

Tracking treatments

Most preservation labs track their conservation treatments through a database that links to, or shadows, their institution’s library or museum catalog.  For many years these databases were home grown, with labs using Access or FileMaker Pro – and that is what The Preservation Lab opted to do.   While there are now commercial and consortial alternatives, we are still using our homegrown Access database for now.
Occasionally the lab is asked to share what we use.  So, by semi-popular demand, attached please find the Treatment Database!  Though not perfect, it might serve as a good model to those beginning to organize their treatment documentation beyond printed sheets and physical file cabinets.  Some data has been kept so that you can experiment with the functionality.

Access database, conservation treatment

Screenshot of Treatment Database


To download the treatment database go to the following web address – https://uc.box.com/s/8sq75e5dxe889ezwzteh2dsrrbkmt7t1.  Read this file first, https://uc.box.com/s/rn34n4we0wrxpdj1s2p7xg6abg7mavdx, to help make sense of the databases organization.
[Note:  Access databases won’t PREVIEW in this cloud based storage, but once you download the database it will function just fine.]
Once you download them, make them your own…they are clay ready to be molded to your needs!  Go forth and be productive!
Holly Prochaska (UCL) — Preservation Librarian

Fun with PhotoDoc: Infrared (Edition 7)

At the end of last year the lab purchased a modified UV-Vis-IR Nikon through MaxMax so that we can start to play around with infrared photography.  Infrared photography (IR) is commonly used in fine art conservation as an examination tool.  Reflected IR can be helpful when trying to identify pigments, inks, coatings, etc. and transmitted IR can helpful for viewing watermarks, underdrawings, and linings. We’ve only just started dabbling with IR photography, but I wanted to share some photos from my most recent session with reflected IR.

This is a full leather photo album from the Public Library of Cincinnati & Hamilton County’s collection.  This early 1900s photo album contains hand-colored silver gelatin photographs taken by A. Nielen.   The photographs appear to depict his travels through the US and Canada, and various landmarks and neighborhoods of Cincinnati are represented.

This seemed like a good object for reflected IR because of the hand-coloring on the photographs and the white ink inscription below each photograph.  I began by taking a representative visible light image (first image below) using our modified UV-Vis-IR camera, incandescent lighting, and the X-Nite CC1 filter on our 50mm lens.  Then, being careful not to move the position of the camera or the object, I switched to the X-Nite 830 filter (830nm) and converted that image to grayscale in Photoshop (second image below).  Then I took my visible light image and my reflected IR image into Photoshop to create the false-color image (third image below).  The digital false-color image is a combined representation of the visible and infrared images, and it’s actually quite simple to make.  You basically copy and paste the various channels for the VIS and IR image as follows, green to blue, red to green, and IR to red.  The false-color image allows you to better differentiate and characterize the various materials (pigments, inks, etc.) and potentially even identify them if you have sufficient known samples to use as references.

Like I said, we’ve only just started using IR and we’ve got a long way to go, but I’m looking forward to experimenting and learning more about it as time goes on.

Jessica Ebert (UCL) – Conservation Technician & Photographic Documentation Tech

Making the Perfect Wheat Starch Paste

As I’m sure anyone in a book & paper lab will attest, good wheat starch paste is key to most, if not all conservation treatments.  And achieving that perfectly smooth and lump-free paste is often easier said than done.  So when the Preservation Lab crew returned from UC’s winter seasonal days off, the first thing on the docket for our resident paste maker, Veronica Sorcher, was to make a brand new batch of wheat starch paste to start the new year off right!  My purpose in documenting her through this process was two fold: first, it’s been ages since I’ve made paste myself (because Veronica almost always does it – she loves it and we love her for always making it!) and I could use a refresher, and secondly, I thought it would be interesting to show the making of (or behind-the-scenes, BTS, if you will) of something so core to the day-to-day conservation in the lab.  To give those who might not understand how much attention is put into the quality of every aspect of what we do here in the lab.  Plus, I thought it might be fun!  I hope you enjoy…
 

A huge thank you to Veronica for being the paste making master she is and allowing me to film her and to Catarina for allowing me to film her while she strained and used the lovely paste that had just been made.
Jessica Ebert (UCL) – Conservation Technician