WILLIAMSTOWN, MA.- Join Tom Branchick, director of the Williamstown Art Conservation Center (WACC), for a guided tour of Stone Hill Center, including a behind-the-scenes look at conservators at work. WACC, located in the Tadao Ando designed Stone Hill Center at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, is the largest regional conservation center in the country and treats objects ranging from historic artifacts, antiques, and heirlooms to some of the most important paintings, watercolors, drawings, photographs, sculpture, and furniture in the United States. WACC has conserved well-known works of art including Van Gogh’s Irises, Thomas Hart Benton’s America Today murals, and Jackson Pollock’s Number 2, 1949. Tours, free with paid gallery admission, will be offered on Thursdays, July 2, 16, 30, and August 13 and 27, at 4 pm. Space is limited. Reservations are required and must be made in advance by calling 413-458-0524..
Founded in 1977 to address the conservation and preservation needs of a small consortium of collecting institutions in the Northeast, WACC is a nonprofit organization serving more than fifty-three member museums and historical societies, as well as many individuals and corporations. WACC conservators also manage and staff the Atlanta Art Conservation Center, established 2001 in partnership with the High Museum of Art.
WACC is a full-service facility conserving paintings, works on paper, photographs, furniture, frames, sculpture, ethnographic and decorative arts objects, and archaeological and historic artifacts. WACC is the only regional lab that provides a full range of scientific and analytical services. Such services are useful to collectors, curators, and art historians who seek information that may help to date or authenticate a work of art, or who wish to explore an artist’s technique or establish a history of alteration. Conservators use scientific analysis for all of these purposes, as well as to understand the physical composition of an object in order to decide on the best course of treatment. The facility includes an 11-foot-by-11-foot imaging room, one of only three on the East Coast.
