SCIENZA E BENI CULTURALI XXXII.2016
Antonio Rava, restauratore Soc. Rava e C. S.r.l., docente Corso Restauro Arte Contemporanea dell’Università di Torino presso il Centro di Conservazione e Restauro dei Beni Culturali di Venaria Reale, Torino, antonio.ravaec@gmail.com
Conservation of contemporary art implies a number of challenges for the practicional restorers, including the study of a philosophical approach for the problems concerning the identity of the works, a legal support for the protection in controversy between artist, owner, museum and gallery, and a thorough practice
for the continuous prevention to avoid worst problems in the future. But a practical work is needed now if we want to transmit the message to the future, otherwise everything could be forgotten and lost with an ongoing decay. Many new materials are used in contemporary art, including the more traditional ones, and the conservative problems seem unaffordable facing new special use of lights, smells, sounds, organic foods and natural products, body derivates and waste recycled stuff, only considering a small example of those. present in the works of art today. All the new materials request important studies in order to implement preventive conservation, finding solutions for the restoration needs. Many different cases are confronted in connection with the artist intent, developing a continuous dialogue between restorers and artists that has given an enormous development to the field. A new theoretical approach would eventually support the conservation of these difficult works in the future, giving a basis for the definition of the structural characteristics and the dynamics of the works. It is important to give an answer to the difficult questions which in this moment constitute a challenge for the restorers, including which sort and how many variations could a work of art undergo , while still being the same as ever. An answer will be given concerning which are the limits for the owners in the field of exhibiting and changing the characteristics of the works and finally which is the role of the restorer of contemporary art today.
Parole chiave/Key-words: Restoration, preventive conservation, contemporary art, orthodoxy, eresy