Museum Quality Methods & Results We are located at The Woodshed Gallery, 1243 Pond Street, Franklin MA 02038   Open by Appointment Wednesdays thru Saturdays. Please call 508-533-6277 or email for an appointment Contact email: bruce@cleanoilpaintings.com OIL PAINTING CLEANING, RESTORATION & REPAIR NATION-WIDE HOME    ABOUT US/DRIVING DIRECTIONS  PRICES  SHIPPING  SERVICE REQUEST   PAINTINGS FOR SALE   APPRAISAL   AUCTIONS  EMAIL  BLOG         An art conservator and respected artist, Bruce Wood demonstrates painting techniques at art associations across New England.  (Photo by Greg Gale.)     Our Art Conservator   Oil painting cleaning, restoration and repair are among the fine art conservation services offered by Clean Oil Paintings, based at The Woodshed Gallery in Franklin Massachusetts.   The in-house oil painting conservator is Bruce Wood, who has been repairing and cleaning oil and acrylic paintings privately for over twenty-five years.    Bruce Wood is a member of the International Institute of Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works, and has fine art degrees from Massachusetts College of Art (BFA) and The School of the Art Institute of Chicago (MFA).    After graduating, he worked for the Art History Department of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.  He befriended the museum's conservators and was introduced to current approaches to the conservation and restoration of paintings and prints.   Upon leaving the Art History Department, he sought an apprenticeship in painting restoration.  With none available, he accepted a one-year apprenticeship in color transparency retouching at Spectrum Studio in Chicago, where he learned the discipline of exact color matching and invisible image alteration.   Eventually, Bruce opened his own photo retouching studio in Chicago, with accounts including Keebler, Quaker Oats, McDonalds, Jim Beam, Coors and Helene Curtis.   With the advent of computerized photo alteration, he returned to his original goal of being a painting conservator.  For seventeen years he operated the Fenway Galleries in Chicago and Michigan, selling contemporary art and restoring historical paintings.   An oil painter himself, Bruce has studied antique painting techniques, and collected nineteenth and early twentieth century oil paintings.   As a conservator, he has worked on a wide variety of paintings, from a 17th Century French altar panel, to modern works by American masters.         LOCATION:   CleanOilPaintings The Woodshed Gallery 1243 Pond Street Franklin, MA 02038 1-508-533-6277   Hours: Thursday, Friday & Saturday 10-3   Evening and  off-hours appointments are available. Please email or call in your request.   1-508-533-6277   EMAIL   We are located half-way between Boston and Providence, off route 495.   Driving Directions: View Larger Map     A Note From Bruce Wood:   Here are the answers to some questions I get quite often:   1/ I have a painting which could use cleaning, but I've heard that restoration on an oil painting or other work may devalue the painting. Is there any truth to this?   Cleaning and restoration are two different things.  First, cleaning is a good thing.  It adds value, like polishing a diamond would.   In fact, paintings and jewelry are the only two classes of antiques which benefit from cleaning (to my knowledge.)   Restoration also is a good thing, if done to current museum standards.  Over the years, restoration has received a bad reputation because of the many unqualified and/or unskilled people calling themselves restorers. Their main fault, aside from using questionable methods, has been wholesale retouching, instead of in-painting.  Retouching generally means covering over areas of old paint with new paint.  In-painting means adding paint only where it is missing. For example if there is a scratch in the paint, a retoucher would paint over it and also paint over the adjacent areas to blend it in.  An in-painter would add paint only to the scratch, with as little overlap onto the original paint layer as possible.   2/  I have heard of using a black light to determine if color has been added to a painting which would also devalue its worth.   Here is where the difference between retouching and in-painting is critical. UV lights are a handy tool to detect repairs, but keep in mind that they are not infallible.  If the UV light shows large areas of retouching, it is possible that the painting's value would be less than a similar work in original condition.  If the light shows in-painting, or scattered small areas of repair, the value is generally not discounted (sort-of depends on how critical the damage was.)  Repairs like lining to strengthen a canvas (when done well) also do not usually detract from value.   Consider this:  Every major museum has a conservation department to restore and clean paintings.  Most, if not all of the masterpieces on display have been cleaned and re-varnished, and have some degree of invisible restoration.     So, the short answer is:  Cleaning and restoration, when done to museum standards, actually adds value to an oil painting.   I hope this helps your future art-care decisions.     -Bruce     Visit our online shop Conservator's Choice at Ruby Lane

Clean Oil Painting is located at The Woodshed Gallery, 1243 Pond Street, Franklin MA 02038 

Open by Appointment Wednesdays thru Saturdays.

Appointments are available at other times.

tel: 1-508-533-6277 

Contact email: bruce@cleanoilpaintings.com

HOME    ABOUT US/DRIVING DIRECTIONS  PRICES  SHIPPING  SERVICE REQUEST   PAINTINGS FOR SALE   APPRAISAL   AUCTIONS  EMAIL  BLOG

Boston Area Code 617, Area Code 339, Area Code 351, Area Code 413, Area Code 508, Area Code 774, Area Code 781, Area Code 857, Area Code 978 & Providence Area Code 401

Nation-wide oil painting restoration cleaning and repair.

Oil Painting Cleaning & Restoration Services for clients in Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia,  Wisconsin & Wyoming

©2013, 2014, 2015, 2016 Clean Oil Paintings, Franklin, MA 02038