Madeleine is an independent paintings conservator based in The Hague. She graduated from the Courtauld Institute of Art with a Bachelor of Arts in the History of Art in 2014, and from the the University of Amsterdam with a post-Master’s degree in Paintings Conservation in 2019. She approaches wax-resin linings with an interest in the structure of canvas paintings and their preventive conservation in particular.

Her main treatment project during the Master’s was a seventeenth-century wax-resin lined painting with multiple large losses in the original canvas and a complex treatment history. Later in her training Madeleine was fortunate to proofread Dr Emilie Froment’s doctoral thesis, and could complement her budding practical experience by reading this in-depth research of colour change in seventeenth-century paintings after wax-resin lining.

She went on to research the vibration damping effect of backing boards on canvas paintings in the final year of her training with Dr Bill Wei (then National Cultural Heritage Agency of The Netherlands). This was an opportunity to interview ten Dutch museums on their backing board application practices, and compare the vibration damping effect of the backing board materials and their attachment systems on a dummy on a vibration table. Doing this research gave Madeleine a better understanding of the multitude of factors that influence the stiffness of a canvas and the difficulties of a one-fits-all solution as far as backing boards are concerned.

The experience of designing a dummy later informed a collaboration with Dr Kerstin Kracht (Vibrations Management). Together with Ruth Hoppe (then Kunstmuseum Den Haag), Madeleine made dummies that Dr Kracht would subject to vibrations until paint loss occurred. The choice of materials and artificial ageing parameters was realistic enough that they could occur in an existing painting, but produced in the paint layers a cohesive strength low enough that they would eventually fail during vibration. Making the dummies both useful for the testing and close to a “real” painting was a fun challenge.

Today Madeleine regularly prepares paintings for loan at the Kunstmuseum Den Haag. This includes providing preventive care for canvas paintings by applying backing boards with inserts. The inserts are a fleece that comes lightly into contact with the back of the canvas, limiting its movement during transport. Although this brings good support to the canvas, new research (from Dr Kracht and the Kröller-Müller Museum, for example) has already improved on the system.