| A two-year restoration campaign at Villanova University has begun on a 17th century painting traditionally attributed to baroque master Pietro da Cortona. The Presentation of David to King Saul after Slaying Goliath, colloquially known as The Triumph of David (144"x228"), was originally housed in Nemi Castle until its donation by Princess Eugenia Ruspoli, nee Berry, in 1951 to Villanova University. For about 60 years, it hung on the walls in the Old Falvey Reading Room until it was taken down for restoration in 2013. The painting requires significant restoration including a varnish replacement, canvas mends, and corrections to prior, less-scrupulous restoration campaigns. In order to provide the best conservation and treatment plan for the painting, it is important to employ a multitude of analytical techniques to obtain the most complete understanding of the painting's provenance, history, and possible attribution. Through scientific research, a better understanding can be obtained of the materials and methods utilized in the painting's original construction and subsequent restoration campaigns. In order to accomplish this, a host of traditional analytical methods are used to image and characterize the pigments and binders present in the original and restoration layers of the painting, including: fluorescence microscopy, infrared microscopy, portable x-ray fluorescence, and scanning electron microscopy paired with energy dispersive x-ray spectroscopy. In addition to traditional techniques, more non-destructive type methods of analysis are being developed, particularly in regards to the identification of binding materials. In this thesis, desorption electrospray ionization mass spectrometry (DESI-MS) has been applied to image binding materials present in cross-sections from paintings. DESI-MS can readily distinguish between areas of oil paint versus areas of more modern materials based upon the stratigraphy of characteristic molecular ions. |
