Potential Clients
Fine Art Insurers, Title Insurers, and Loss Adjusters
Authenticity and Attribution Questions
We address questions on authenticity and attribution with a wide range of scientific technologies. The results can identify not only the materials and techniques used by the artist but also subsequent conservation treatments. These findings are then compared to the extensive literature on specific artist’s materials and techniques. We also consult chemical databases referenced to the dates of introduction and use of artists’ materials: pigments, binding media, fillers, etc.
Types of Fine Art
We have decades of experience with a wide range of art objects. This includes paintings, folk art, antiquities, antique furniture, murals, metalwork, glasses and ceramics, photographs, and painted surfaces.
Scientific Techniques
We employ state-of-the-art techniques specifically designed to perform analyses at the microscale. Depending upon your needs, we can use the following analytical techniques to us to answer authenticity and attribution questions.
- X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy (XRF)
- Scanning electron microscopy with x-ray microanalysis (SEM-EDS)
- Ultraviolet and Visible light microscopy
- Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR)
- Raman spectroscopy
- X-ray microdiffraction (XRD)
- Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS)
- Pyrolysis gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (pyGC-MS)
- X-ray absorption near edge spectroscopy (XANES)
- Confocal X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy
- Synchrotron x-ray intensity mapping to image buried paintings
- Hyperspectral imaging and Multispectral Imaging
- Fiber Optic Reflectance Spectroscopy (FORS)
Every project begins with a discussion of your particular questions or concerns, an assessment of the artwork, and our recommendation on which scientific techniques would most definitively answer these questions.
We will travel to your site to conduct nondestructive analysis and to remove any microsamples if necessary, in consultation with you. Alternately, we accept delivery of works of art for in-depth examinations and research.