Many people have heard that we were responsible for saving the wonderful, gorgeous mural of a tropical jungle by Jessie Arms Botke from demolition but few have heard the story. So, here it is!
In 1992 I got a call from The Oaks heath resort in Ojai, California about a wonderful 7′ x 26′ mural by Jessie Arms Botke, painted in 1953. Botke has become very well known in the art history of early California and is collected by all the major collections of this type of art. Her prolific number of paintings of birds, fish and wonderful plants are usually all of high quality and can be expensive my most people’s standards.
The Oaks was about to go through a remodel which was going to involve the demolition of the wall on which this mural was painted. Actually, the mural was painted, in oil, on canvas then was glued to the wall. We were hired to carefully remove the canvas (that was adhered with wall paper paste) in a way that did not set into motion the mass flaking of the paint layers.
I had a nice couple of hours with Marilyn McMahon, Santa Barbara News Press Staff writer extraordinaire, today in office at Fine Art Conservation Laboratories. She has been writing interviews and profiles for the Lifestyle section of the newspaper for more than 35 years.
Marilyn McMahon SB News Press Writer of the Lifestyle Section
Preservation Week April 22-28, 2012 at the Library of Congress is a big deal! And they are going to have couple of interesting events about saving your stuff at home…
Laguna Beach and Costa Mesa are places I go often to meet with clients who collect paintings. I also meet with people in Corona del Mar, Newport Beach, Tustin, Santa Ana. Some of the clients are private collectors and others are institutions like the Laguna Art Festival for whom I’m a consultant as they are working on storing and taking care of their collection that they have been gathering for decades. While I was in Corona del Mar, I met with art dealer Fred Page and he was nice enough to to make this video testimonial for our art restoration and painting conservation services.
Fred specializes in Post War Expressionist Art, art from the 1st quarter of the 20th century and contemporary art.
How about clicking on the THUMBS UP to show your support?
I’m working this week at the Daughters Of Utah Pioneers International Museum in Salt Lake City on two large paintings on canvas. Sometimes because of the size of the paintings, I go work on location.
While sitting in my booth at the LA Art Show I looked up and noticed a man young man in his late 20’s in a fashion challenged suit and tie staring at my wide screen monitor of the many photos of the processes of graffiti removal from the freeway mural Jim Morphesis Monument. He asked me why I thought there was no good quality graffiti art in this art expo. We went back and forth with a few ideas and then I asked him if he was an artist.
He had been a tagger in his younger years but he was way over that now. In fact, he was sorry and knows it was wrong. He’s doing some artwork with graffiti art style. He had never heard the term “aerosol art.” He even dropped MCLA’s name as an organization for whom he was doing art.
George Stern as been on the hunt! Look what he found just prior to the LA Art Show… its never been seen, worked on (cleaned or restored) or been on the market. Here’s what it looked like when it was found:
Sierra Lake Scene by Edgar Payne, Before Conservation
FACL, Inc. has many clients in the Carmel, CA area including the cities of Carmel and Monterey, The Monterey Museum of Art, The Monterey Maritime Museum and numerous galleries in Carmel. Some of those galleries include Trotter Galleries, Karges Fine Art, Del Monte Fine Art, Westbrook Galleries, Josh Hardy Galleries, Carmel Fine Arts, Jim Rieser Gallery, Portnoy Gallery, Winfied Gallery and David Keaton, though not an established gallery sells out of his home.All of these dealers are specialized in either early California Impressionist Art or Post Wax Abstract Expressionism. We also do work for many private clients including a huge mural job in the stone castle on Pescadero Point known as the historical Clark Estate. Here’s a photo from our work in this highly inaccessible property. I’m getting ready to put together a page on this website dedicated to telling about the very interesting project.
This tagger was caught while tagging someplace else the same weekend
This is one of the “monikers” that we got tagged with last weekend, the day after we finished the removal of the huge tag of the bottom half of the mural. This graffiti covered about a 4′ x 10′ area. Interesting thing is that this vandal got picked up by police the same weekend he tagged us while he was tagging someplace else! So, the Sheriff is “on it.” They know who the other guy is too, I think. And we caught them on video!
Many people have heard that we were responsible for saving the wonderful, gorgeous mural of a tropical jungle by Jessie Arms Botke from demolition but few have heard the story. So, here it is!
