murals 4

This is the mural as we found it in the former recreation room of one of the apartment buildings in the Williamsburgh Housing Projects in Brooklyn, NY. The mural had been covered with numerous layers of wall paint. There was flooding at one point damaging the bottom 4" - 5" of the mural. Some of the design elements can still be deciphered.

Three layers of facings were applied to the face of the painting to protect the surface of the mural during the various different conservation processes involved to remove the mural from the wall.

The mural was attached to a Sonotube® with tabs to roll it as it was carefully chiseled off the masonary wall with pneumatic chisel guns.

There were numerous layers of plaster, concrete and eventually a brick wall. Which were removed mechanically with a pneumatic chisel gun.

After removal from the wall the was mural carefully wrapped in foam, plastic and cardboard for transport back to the studio for further conservation work.

The mural was then rolled on to a large diameter sonotube for transport.

At the studio the plaster and white lead adhesive on the back of the mural was removed by sandblasting. the mural was then lined onto a linen liner with BEVA adhesive. It was then put on a smaller diameter sonotube and put on to a work rack to have the overpaint removed from the face.

A rack system was designed to have the mural rolled as the overpaint was removed methodically using chemicals, heat and mechanical methods.

After the surface overpaint was removed the painting was stretched on to a work strainer to enable access to the entire front and back surfaces. The painting was eventually lined onto linen. The losses were filled, sealed and inpainted. A final surface varnish was applied to the finished piece. The mural is now hanging in the Brooklyn Museum of Art in NYC. https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/opencollection/exhibitions/3270

During the depression the WPA had commissioned numerous artists in New York City to paint murals in the public housing projects in the five boroughs. Over the course of time the murals were somehow forgotten and painted over or covered with new walls. The curator of arts at the housing authority at the time, Michelle London was asked to find these mural some of which were painted by Jackson Pollack, Mark Rothko, Phillip Guston and Ilya Bolotowsky to name a few. She discovered an Ilya Bolotowsky in the basement of a building. The room was originally used as a recreation room by the tenants then sometime in the late 50's was turned into a management office and the mural was painted over with wall paint. Ms London after extensive research found the mural behind desks and file cabinets. She commissioned the studio I was working as a manager at the time Margret Watherston Inc. to remove them from the site and restore them to their former glory.