Beth Heller Conservation
Fixing paper so it lives longerArchive for January, 2009
Fly, little iron bird
Fly, little iron bird
Originally uploaded by tapescraper Click on the pic to see the whole photo series.
I bought a 600 pound lump of cast iron a couple of weeks ago, and had to move my new friend Jacques to a storage unit until I figure out where he will live and be useful. After consulting with Kevin Auer and Bill Minter, I opted not to do as they recommended, which was to remove the blade and counterweight and then let 4 guys pick it up by hand and move it. No, I hired a guy with a forklift and a lift-gate truck, and left it all intact. That left me and 3 guys to supervise and annoy the forklift guy. If anyone needs a forklift guy in Colorado, let me know and I’ll give you the referral – he was great!
Here’s a quick tip: before you tell the fork lift guy to come on down, measure WITH A TAPE MEASURE, rather than guessing by using your body and raised arm, the height of the garage door the fork-lift has to fit through. I was lucky by about a half-inch.
Next, make sure the pallet on which the beast has been resting for the past 20 years will not collapse. Again, lucky. I will be reinforcing that sucker before we move it again, that’s for sure.
Also, have some chain handy to drag the pallet out of the garage, and some straps to give the forklift something to hook onto instead of the actual iron. Guess what…lucky again…they had some extra laying around.
For someone who generally plans out everything well in advance, I didn’t think this through as well as I could have, having no concept of what would be required. If anyone else has to do this, feel free to contact me. I’ve got to move it one more time, and by then I’ll have it down.
One more thing...The Guild of Bookworkers loans and sells a dvd, Examination of the Jacques Board Shear. William Minter, 2000. I plan on getting my hands on it soon.
Tomorrow’s Ephemera Today
Something called Paper Camp took place this past weekend in London, and some very interesting experiments were performed. This person blogged about it. I kind of wish I had been there, but my brain might have exploded from all the creativity, so it’s probably safer that I wasn’t.
However. Prepare to deal with this in the conservation lab of the future. Or of next week.
Bogart, or, Protecting Cultural Heritage
Once upon a time, in the 1980s, when I was an art student undergrad living in an apartment complex full of same, I went to a party. One of my neighbors had an unusual pet, and brought said pet to the party. This pet, name of Bogart, was a very young panther. I have no idea what happened to Bogart once he grew up, and really don’t want to think about an adult panther living in a two bedroom apartment in Austin. That is not the point of this story.
The point is that a bored Bogart gathered up everyone’s purses, piled them in a corner of the room, and stood guard. No one was allowed to have their purse until the neighbor tempted the cat away with some meat.
Some of you may know that Bogart can also be a verb meaning to keep something to oneself. From the urban dictionary: “To keep something all for oneself, thus depriving anyone else of having any. A slang term derived from the last name of famous actor Humphrey Bogart because he often kept a cigarette in the corner of his mouth, seemingly never actually drawing on it or smoking it.” As in “heeeey, man…don’t bogart that…”
How does this relate to preservation and conservation? Glad you asked. I feel like Bogart sometimes. There are times that I want to gather all the stuff into a corner and not let anyone at it. You want to look at it, but you find my request to not drink coffee over it inconvenient? You want to squash that book onto the photocopier when I’m not looking – who cares if you break the spine off? You want to know if we’ve got some extra archival material that you can take home? No! Mine! Stay back! Grrrrr [bares teeth].
One the other paw, I know, I know – what good is having the stuff if no one gets to play with it. We’ve got plenty that will make it into the next century or two, and sharing will help gather support for ensuring that the institution continues. We’ve made great strides in the past year in terms of creating better environmental conditions, gaining intellectual and physical control over the collections, and stirring up interest. People DO seem to take preservation and access issues more seriously, and I am VERY excited about our progress and the support of the higher ups. It’s all good.
I just feel a bit attached, is all. Someone’s got to bar the door, so call me Katy and I’ll be the one to try to slow processes down. I’ll ask annoying questions about de-accessioning policies and responsibility for cultural heritage. I’ll make people examine their plans and actions and their potential consequences. I’ll be the bad guy and say no until someone higher up says yes with full knowledge of the whys and hows.
So, this is all just to say that I am embracing my inner Bogart. And..I’m not sure distracting me with a large hunk of meat will work, but you can try.
