Featured Restoration sticker shock

We have an old painting that's been in my husband's family and it needs to be restored. It is 15" x 12". I found a qualified expert and sent him photos. He would still need to see it in person, but his fast estimate was $2800-$3100.



He admitted that's probably more than it's worth in the marketplace, but if it's a treasured family heirloom, we might consider it worth the cost.



We could buy a small car for that.

 

Or just the mag wheels for a new Benz !
Everything is relative.......
Speaking of which.....maybe you could get the 'relatives' to help with the cost.
Promote it as a family project...!

 

You mean the relatives who don't speak to each other? One brother lives an hour and a half away and hasn't seen his 96 year old mother in fifteen years.

 

We paid full market value for the family home because his father was in a nursing home at the time and that's the law. Then the other siblings proceeded to tell us what we should do with it. One nephew (a real estate appraiser) showed up once with his business partner from NYC. We thought it was a friendly visit until he started taking the guy on a house tour pointing out different things. Apparently, he thought he might inherit the house some day or talk us into selling. No way, Jose! My house. My kids inherit. They've put in sweat equity helping us fix it up. Oh, am I ranting again? I do that a lot.

 

What does the painting need? The estimate sounds very high to me for such a small painting.

 

Walter McPherson Bayne is the artist.

 

Ahh , family...!
I understand !
Bin there , done that !

 

OK, Bev....that does look like it needs major work !

 

That craquelure is getting a bit out of hand. Looks like the paint and ground is starting to separate from the canvas. I imagine that would be a very tedious project to put right. I wonder if there would be a way to clean and stabilize the painting without addressing the full restoration of the craquelure?

It seems that if the painting were cleaned, that you could tint the white showing in the cracks and seal the whole thing with varnish to improve the appearance and seal it from further damage. While this might not be the correct approach toward restoration, I don't see what harm can be done if the cost of restoration exceeds the value of the painting. You could use a removable varnish so that the process could be reversed down the road if warranted.

 

Some guy who a friend recommended cleaned it two years ago for $150. I should have known better. It looked fine before he touched it. All these cracks appeared after. Maybe it had been inpainted before, but it wasn't like this.

 

Sounds like he got it too wet when cleaning. As it dried out, it caused the ground to shrink, curl, and lift from the canvas a bit.

 

We should have left it alone.

 

Bev,don't kick yourself ! How were you to know that would happen ? Part of the reason I curtailed buying a lot of art was the few times I priced to get something cleaned (not even restored!) it was ridiculously expensive ! So now I leave the stained paper or crackled or filthy paintings alone !

 

Ian (the expert) told me that probably when the friend of a friend cleaned it, he removed old fill paint where it had been restored a long time ago
. I don't think so because there were details that looked normal. If it had big, filled in cracks I think I'd have noticed. I went over it pretty thoroughly with a magnifying glass before we could ID the artist. I haven't really looked at a restored painting to see inpainting, but wouldn't it have shown up?

 

I would think that would have depended on how good the restorer was.....wonder if the "friend" unwittingly put some varnish or urethane on it trying to be 'helpful'....... also, from what I have read & seen on TV shows.....PROFESSIONAL restorers (if I'm remembering correctly!) only use a water base paint for in-painting so as not to destroy the original painting! So, maybe that got removed when the "friend" cleaned it.....sounds plausible.....
BUT, it IS a dear, sweet painting!!!! I would check other museums or gallerys before springing the big bucks!!!!

 

Aquitaine.....you know the last post here was 9 months ago....right..?

just sayin....

 

But I understand how you feel!!!!!

 

Yeah......I did notice.....I just happened to be browsing OLD posts.....so SHOOT ME!!!!!!!!!! It was JUST my 2cents worth.......... Haha....and if it was THAT long ago..........how come YOU'RE reading it?????
inquiring minds want to know???

 

I have it on my watched threads, and must have forgot to UN-watch it .....so it popped up once you reactivated it....

If you have something relevant to add to any old thread by all means go for it......but you yourself commented on another old thread , that you only just noticed hadn't been posted to since Dec.......so since Dec was only 'days' ago and this one here was over 9 months ago ...I wasn't sure if you had noticed that .

Please then, pay me no heed , & continue your trip down memory lane...

Oh....& ....