CHArt CHArt Computers and the History of Art - 1998 Conference Paper Abstract
The goal of the proposed research project will be to simulate both the original appearance of selected Hilliard portrait miniatures and the evolution of a painting from the preparation of the ground to a finished work using computer image manipulation techniques. A multimedia presentation of the results in a broader historical context will enable conservation issues both specific and general to be brought to a wider audience. The use of animated sequences of the restored images offers the potential for simulating the appearance of the works when held in the hand and optimally inclined or moved to view transient effects as intended by the artist with his extensive use of burnished gold and silver highlights, the latter in most cases now sadly tarnished.
A holistic approach will be employed in the interpretation of the artist's treatise and the subsequent 'virtual' restoration process. This will extend to practical experimentation using the prescribed painting and jewel simulating techniques . Close study of a wide range of the surviving works together with painting from life in the studio offers a means of gaining an understanding of Hilliard's, poetically expressed and particularly challenging, portraiture objectives. The technical integrity of the project will involve the interpretation and application of the findings of the considerable body of research carried out on these works within the V&A and close liaison with the existing senior conservator responsible for the miniatures collection.
The project will involve the collation and visual comparison of stylistic features of a wide range of Hilliard's work, and there is potential for using this database to address attribution issues and possibly the identification of some of the unknown subjects, in a way that has not hitherto been practical.