History Center opens new conservation annex
Conservator Rhonda Wozniak cleans and restores silverware at the new Museum Conservation Center, which was opened by the Senator John Heinz History Center.
Conservator Rikke Foulke works on an old painting at the Museum Conservation Center.
Senator John Heinz History Center President and CEO Andy Masich and conservator Nancy Boomhower look over a quilt at the new Museum Conservation Center.
PITTSBURGH – There are all kind of therapies out there.
Bibliotherapy, dance therapy, light therapy, Gestalt therapy, animal-assisted therapy, equine-assisted therapy, and on and on.
The Museum Conservation Center, freshly opened by the Senator John Heinz History Center in Pittsburgh’s Strip District, could well be the only place you can travel to for “artifact therapy.”
In the words of Andy Masich, the history center’s president and chief executive officer, “artifact therapy” is a straightforward assessment of whether the moldy school book unearthed in the basement or the 18th century Windsor chair with a missing leg yanked out of the attic is suitable for the painstaking work necessary for its conservation.
“We can tell you if an object is worthy of preservation or not,” Masich explained last month, a few days before the center formally opened its doors. “Unless it has real emotional value, sometimes it’s not.”
But along with occasionally delivering some unwelcome news to sentimentalists or people who mistakenly believe they’re sitting on a gold mine that will finance their retirement, the history center’s conservation annex, one of the first in the country to be affiliated with a museum, is a site where visitors can bring prized objects and family heirlooms and have them sized up by professionals who can offer insights on how to preserve them, or connect their owners to conservators who can carry out the necessary repair and mending.
Experts are on hand during regular business hours to discuss how to preserve quilts, art, clothing, furniture, photographs and more. A number of workshops are also planned throughout the year so visitors who have never set foot in a museum studies class can get tips on preserving prized possessions before they crumble to dust or are otherwise unusable.
And the history center is quick to emphasize that there is a clear difference between conservation and restoration. Conservation tries to stabilize and improve the appearance of something without substantially altering it; restoration, on the other hand, can bring new materials into the process as something is restored to its original state.
“Something that is conserved, cleaned and stabilized will be preserved for future generations,” said Barb Antel, the history center’s conservation services manager.
The Heinz History Center has a substantial collection of relics with ties to Pittsburgh, only a portion of which are on display to the public. They have teamed up with KDKA-TV for periodic “Antiques Roadshow”-style programs, “Pittsburgh’s Hidden Treasures,” and, as a result, they regularly field calls from residents of the region who wonder if the history center is interested in acquiring something they have, or if someone there can offer advice on how to preserve it. The idea of creating a conservation center that is both accessible to the public and will broaden the public’s understanding of preserving objects of historical or personal value grew from there.
“The history center is Pittsburgh’s oldest cultural institution,” Masich explained. “And we’ve become the go-to place for history. We want to deal with all your history needs.”
It is located in a century-old, nine-story building on Penn Avenue that once housed a chair manufacturer, a restaurant equipment supply company, a houseware supplier and other businesses. For years, officials at the history center had been eyeing the structure at 1221 Penn Ave. Among its advantages were its abundant space and proximity to the history center so it could also serve as a climate-controlled storage facility for all the items it owns that are not on display. They can now be readily transported from one building to another.
“We’re storing the memory of Pittsburgh here,” said Anne Madarasz, the history center’s museum division director. “It’s the history behind the piece that’s important to us. That’s the difference between an antiques shop and a museum.”
Having previously used a nearby warehouse, the new storage space takes up 55,000 feet and is strictly controlled for climate, humidity and pests.
“This is a much better area,” she added.
A workshop session on family archives happened Sept. 20 at the conservation center, and a second will follow Nov. 22, this one a more in-depth presentation on how paper documents can be preserved. A holiday-themed presentation on family heirlooms is planned for Dec. 11. Information on both is available by calling 412-454-6450 or by going online to www.heinzhistorycenter.org.