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(Gerónimo)

(b Caracas, Aug 29, 1920; d Caracas, Nov 3, 2004).

Venezuelan designer, potter, educator, curator, and museum administrator. Arroyo was one of the first professional designers in Venezuela. He graduated in drawing and painting from the Escuela de Artes Plásticas y Artes Aplicadas de Caracas in 1938. From 1938 to 1940 Arroyo lived in New York City, where he worked at the Venezuelan pavilion at the New York World’s Fair (1939–1940) and assisted Luis Alfredo López Méndez with painting La Vida Venezolana on the ceiling of the canopy of the pavilion. Back in Venezuela, from 1940 to 1946, Arroyo taught art at the Liceo de Aplicación in Caracas. During this period, he taught and also worked as an interior designer (Librería Magisterio (1944) and Gran Exposición Nacional de Industria y Comercio de Maracaibo (1945)). From 1946 to 1948 he studied design and pottery at the Carnegie Institute of Technology in Pittsburgh, PA.

In 1949...

In the English language, the terms “plasterwork” and “stucco” are used virtually interchangeably to describe everything from plain render on walls or ceilings, to elaborate modeled or cast panels, cornices, and ornamental enrichment supported by armatures. Raw materials and methods of construction have varied enormously over time and region; but ultimately all plasterwork has as its basis either lime or gypsum. The illusory and imitative nature of elaborate plasterwork belies the complexity of the medium, which forms a network of interrelationships with concealed structural materials including timber, stone, and metal. Conservation treatment may be required where decay, inherent weakness failure, and/or mechanical damage threaten the survival of original material. Generally, the aims of treatment are minimal intervention and maximum preservation to retain authenticity; however, reinstatement of aesthetic integrity is often desirable. This article provides a selective overview of this complex subject, touching upon condition assessment, analysis methods, and preventative conservation measures, whilst focusing more specifically on consolidant behavior and remedial treatment of plasterwork....

The deterioration of wallpaper is caused by the inherent and external dangers common to all works of art on paper (see Paper, §VI). These include acidity (from the paper, support, media, and environment); accumulated dirt and accidental damage; extremes of temperature and humidity; biological attack; and damage caused by overexposure to light. Wallpaper is also subject to damage resulting from defects in the fabric of the building that acts as its ultimate support (see Phillips 1981).

Many of the earliest surviving European wallpapers have been discovered on wooden beams and panels or inside cupboards and boxes. Wood acids, insects, and the natural movement of the wood itself usually result in the paper becoming extremely discolored, brittle, and fragmented. Papers hung on a plaster wall have often fared better, but dampness in the wall may cause staining, mold growth, and contribute to insect activity, especially attack by silver-fish. Additionally, settlement cracks will tear the paper. Wallpaper mounted on canvas and attached to the wall with wooden battens is protected to some extent from these problems. However, the acidity of the aging canvas and adhesives, combined with the continual expansion and contraction of the support (related to changes in relative humidity), can themselves cause discoloration, weakening, and splitting of the paper, while crumbling plaster and dust accumulates in the space behind....

French family of restorers, dealers, cabinetmakers and painters. François-Simon-Alphonse Giroux (d Paris, 1 May 1848) was a pupil of Jacques-Louis David and became a picture restorer, founding his business in Paris at the end of the 18th century. He specialized in genre paintings of medieval ruins and troubadours and bought particularly from a younger generation of artists such as Louis Daguerre, Charles-Marie Bouton (1781–1863), Charles Arrowsmith (b 1798) and Charles Renoux (1795–1846), all of whom painted church interiors. Giroux also admired Gothic art and became the official restorer for Notre-Dame, Paris. His daughter Olympe Giroux and son Alphonse-Gustave Giroux succeeded him in his business. Another son, André Giroux (b Paris, 30 April 1801; d Paris, 18 Nov 1879), was a painter. François-Simon-Alphonse’s firm publicized its stock by holding exhibitions of Old Master paintings and contemporary art and by publishing catalogues of works both for sale and for hire from their premises. After ...

[MoMA] (New York)

The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) was founded in 1929 by patrons Lillie P(lummer) Bliss, Cornelius J. Sullivan and Rockefeller family §(1) to establish an institution devoted to modern art. Over the next ten years the Museum moved three times and in 1939 settled in the Early Modern style building (1938–9) designed by Philip S. Goodwin and Edward Durell Stone that it still occupies at 11 West 53 Street. Subsequent renovations and expansions occurred in the 1950s and 1960s by Philip Johnson, in 1984 by Cesar Pelli and in 2002–4 by Yoshirō Taniguchi (b 1937). MoMA QNS, the temporary headquarters during this project, was subsequently used to provide art storage. In 2000, MoMA and the contemporary art space, P.S.1, Long Island City, Queens, announced their affiliation. Recent projects are shown at P.S.1 in Queens in a renovated public school building.

According to founding director, Alfred H(amilton) Barr...