Chapter 2
• Mission Statement by the Head of Department
• A Brief History of the Formation of the Department
• Function of the Art Handling Team
Art Handling Manual: Mission Statement
The Art Handling Department at the National Gallery has been formed to provide specialised, technical support to a number of different divisions within the Gallery. This includes Conservation, Curatorial, Photographic and Exhibitions as well as a number of other departments. Our role is to help realise the goals of these areas by taking responsibility for the installation, transportation and all aspects of manual handling of the Collection at the Gallery.
Our remit is to follow the highest standard of care for the Collection. As a principal, we consider our work as an arm of Conservation, carrying out our tasks with reference to all current conservation recommendations and believing our first task being the reduction or elimination of risk, and preventing damage to the objects in our care.
We believe we also have a role and a responsibility to lead on innovations and improvements in art handling techniques. To fulfil this aim, we have created a program of design that has produced a series of specialised equipment as well as new procedures to improve our work with the Collection. We continue to look for improvements from within the Department as well as take a keen interest in the work of other departments in the field, helping to inform our own ideas.
The responsibilities of the Department also extend to promoting the work of Art Handling outside of the Gallery environment. This involves creating contacts within the area of art handling, exchanging ideas and techniques and if requested or where a need is identified, creating training opportunities for other art handling operations.
The Art Handling Department occupies an important and significant role within the practical life of the National Gallery. By creating an environment of care and innovation within our field, we aim to contribute to the future activities of the Gallery, ensuring the Collection continues to be used as intended for many years to come.
Patrick O’Sullivan Head of Art Handling The National Gallery
The History of the Department
The logistical challenges of handling the paintings in the National Gallery Collection, have over the years involved removing the Collection in it’s entirety from the building and transporting it to a slate quarry in Wales for the duration of the Second World War. It has also involved the re-displaying the Early Italian Collection in to the newly commissioned Sainsbury Wing and handling countless loans to the Collection as well as installing dozens of exhibitions over the years.
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The 'Elephant case' arriving at Manod quarry in Wales, during the Second World War. Original photo GWR
Until 1993, the handling and movement of the Collection throughout the Gallery was undertaken by a team constituted from the Security Department, known as the ‘Working Party’. This was a core team of three warders, with whom the expertise resided in for routine and also more complex handling tasks. This core team would recruit individuals on an ad hoc basis from the ‘day warders’ to bolster numbers as required. All members of the Working Party were expected to contribute to the work of the Security Department and continue to act as room warders when they were not on Picture Handling duties.
After the opening of the Sainsbury Wing in 1993, the hanging of which marked the pinnacle of achievement for the Working Party, it was decided for various administrative, reasons that the role of art handling should be separated from the Security Department. Therefore a permanent Art Handling Team was formed, which included four newly recruited professional art handlers and four technicians retained from the old Working Party under a new Head of Department.
The Art Handling Team was based in a small office off the Sainsbury Wing Packing Room, where all packing operations had been switched to from the Wilkins Building. This new home was thought to be an appropriate setting due to the direct route through from the new loading bay via the large goods lift, and the proximity to the new exhibition space and Secure Store also off the new packing room.
Over the next few years, the size of the Team continued to grow and accommodating all these extra technicians meant that the small office at times became very crowded. When it became necessary to create a new disabled persons access for the Sainsbury Wing Theatre, the office was reduced by half to make way for a larger corridor, which meant the Team had to return back to the Wilkins Packing Room.
The years since 1993 have been marked by a very rapid development and expansion of the expertise within the Department. Specialist handling equipment designed by the Team and manufactured by outside engineers has now replaced most of the heavy manual handling operations undertaken by the Working Party. The new equipment has been made vital due to the introduction of further Health & Safety Legislation in the workplace, known risks have been greatly reduced as a result.
The Function of the Art Handling Team at the National Gallery
The National Gallery’s Art Handling Team provides the Gallery with personnel who specialise in and are responsible for the scheduling, safe handling, movement, storage and display of the Collection and for all other art works within the Gallery, either as loans or for other reason. This includes activities ranging from the movement of paintings to and from Photography and Conservation Studios, to the installation and de-installation of Exhibitions within the Gallery’s Exhibition spaces. It also covers the continual re-hangs and maintenance of displays within the permanent Collection, including the production of labels from the Editorial Department files.
The upkeep of the two art storage areas within the Gallery is another of the teams’ responsibilities, along with the maintenance and storage of re-usable packing cases, for the protection of paintings whilst in transit to and from loans to other institutions.
The working day starts at 8.00am and finishes at 6.30 pm (Monday to Friday). The team’s main responsibility is to ensure the safety of the Collection and all loans to the Collection and Exhibitions at all times, whilst ensuring stake holders requests are dealt with efficiently. This requires concentration and vigilance on the part of team members who must be alert and continually on the look out for each other and the art works involved while carrying out their duties.
As team members come into contact with the art more closely and frequently than other Gallery staff they are also required to keep the Conservation and Framing Departments informed whenever they come across any irregularities which might require their expertise. For example, gilding losses to frames and any changes to a picture’s condition which might require these departments input.
Once the Gallery opens to the public, work on the main floor in the Gallery would normally be kept to a minimum. Team members would then typically be involved in the packing and unpacking of loans from or to the Collection. There would also be movement of works between the Conservation Studios, and of frames between Lower Conservation and the Framing Workshop. This can be for a variety of reasons, including, glazing and deglazing of frames for loans and restoration work. There is also the maintenance and hanging of displays within the secondary Collection in Lower A Gallery.
Responsibility for the maintenance of the storage areas and the access to works within these areas by curators and visiting scholars, along with monthly security checks of all works within these areas and the Conservation Studios, are also part of the teams remit. Another area which relates to the security of the Collection, for which the team are responsible, is the maintenance of Security Tags which are fitted to approximately half the paintings in the Collection. These are typically installed in those areas of the Gallery where Gallery Assistant cover is not on a room by room basis, namely Lower A Gallery and nine rooms on the main floor. The team must ensure Tags are fitted whenever a painting is hung in these rooms and also replace old Tags on a rolling program as requested by the Security Department.
Finally, the team have to find time for the maintenance of Tool and Picture Trolleys, equipment, hardware, and the working areas within the Wilkins and Sainsbury Wing Packing Rooms without which, the smooth running of the daily operation would be impossible. A lot of our equipment and hardware is designed in-house and this work is covered elsewhere in this manual.
Danny Metcalf Senior Technician (Collections)