Project
REDiscover project will study one of the most important reds in the history of humankind, those obtained from madder plants, with two main goals:
i) to build a methodology that will markedly contribute to the sustainable preservation of madder colours in artworks and;
ii) to explore new artistic applications for historical formulations of madder colours through a dynamic laboratory-studio led research. Hence, it will enhance our cultural heritage access, protection, and valorisation.
Since antiquity, madder reds have been used as dyes and lake pigments to create colour for painting and dyeing. Applied as tempera or oil paints, these colours have faded in treasured artworks. The reasoning behind this colour alteration is still not fully understood. To preserve these prominent colours that were favoured by influential artists, even after the discovery of synthetic substitutes, detailed knowledge of these historic art materials is fundamental. This is only possible when accessing their production methods since today's materials do not represent the formulations used in the past. This is essential for understanding the artists' technique, placing artworks in context, and determining their state of preservation and authenticity. REDiscover members have proven the Winsor & Newton (W&N) 19th Century Archive Database's unique value as a primary source of information on the practices of one of the leading paint manufacturers of the 19th century. Expressing a perfect match between science and art in the 19th century, W&N supplied important artists worldwide, such as J. M. W. Turner (1775-1851) and Amadeo de Souza-Cardoso (1887-1918).
REDiscover aims to address four research questions:
The project is organised into four tasks that combine research on historical documentary sources (Task 1), chemical analysis of pigment reconstructions and historical samples from artworks (Task 2), study of colour alteration (Task 3) and artistic research (Task 4).
Investigation on the W&N 19th Century Archive Database will allow the first systematic study of their manufacture of madder lake pigments, uncovering their recipes' specificities through pigment reconstructions. REDiscover will provide historically accurate reference pigments with detailed information on the manufacturing methods, thoroughly analysed by complementary techniques, and validated by comparison with historical samples from artworks and culturally significant objects. These references will be crucial to optimise analytical tools used to identify madder reds in artworks, particularly with in situ techniques. This will also support breakthroughs in the intrinsically complex structures of madder reds. A deeper understanding of their manufacture and chemistry will impact new conservation and authentication strategies. Furthermore, by conducting artificial ageing experiments on the pigments, we will be able to assess their stability as well as evaluate the extent of degradation and original colour of madder colours in artworks. Artists will actively participate in Task 1 to reappropriate these historical methods and materials and create novel art pieces developed through artistic residences in laboratories at DCR NOVA.
REDiscover will further prove the outstanding value of the W&N documentary archive to the world's heritage and enable us to initiate its nomination process to become a UNESCO Memory of the World Register. Another key output will be the preparation of a workshop with an exhibition at the Slade School of Fine Art - UCL (UK) with the collaboration of the art material company W&N - Colart.
This exploratory project will be accomplished by an interdisciplinary team of highly motivated young researchers supported by international experts in conservation science, technical art history and fine arts. It will lay the foundations for a new approach to studying historic madder reds that will impact the study of other reds ubiquitously found in heritage objects, such as those from lac dye and cochineal.