 Llywodraeth, dweud i'r ddweud, a gweithio'n gweithio'n gwahanol i'r Llywodraeth a Llywodraeth yn ymgyrch. A oedd yng Nghymru, yn Ymgyrch, yn dweud i'r ddweud i'n gweithio. Y gweithio'n gweithio'n gweithio a'r gweithio'n gweithio'n gweithio, yw y ddweud i'r gweithio'n gweithio'n gweithio'n gweithio'n gweithio'n gyfer y Palysau Westminster. Ond dwi'n gweithio'n gweithio'n gweithio'n eu ddechrau oedd yn gweithio'n gweithio'n gweithio'n gweithio'n gweithio'n gweithio'n gweithio'n gweithio, a oedol felly gan dwi'n gweithio'n gweithio, a oedol yn credu y mae'n ddweud â'i gwasanaeth Rhysgwylliant. Ynghydfynol perthynasol yw'r Cosiwn F Weinidog, sydd hyn yn dweud ynghydfynol ar unrhyw ynghydfynol, i wneud y byd yw'r gwahanol. Byddwn yn edrych bod ffyrdd ynghydfynol â'r Gweinod o'r Gweinod, ac yn y ffyrdd ag o'r Gweinod yw'r Gweinod. Ac rydyn ni'n i gweithio yn ddwych â Adrein Heritage, a bod yn ychydig i'w meddwl i chi'n gwybod yn ddiweddol, nad ydych chi'n dod o'n gweithio'r Gweinod. First of all, this is being recorded, it's being filmed, so please turn off any mobile phones. Next one, in the event of a vote in the House of Lords, you will hear division bells ringing. They'll ring fairly loudly. Members who are attending the lecture will go at that point to vote. While the bell is ringing, either if I'm talking or if Adrian is talking at that point, the lecture will stop for a few moments and then will carry on. If the fire alarm should go off, we will all be asked to leave the committee room and staff will advise you on which exit to use when you're leaving the building. I'm going to give a very short historical context to the lecture that Adrian is going to give. The main focus tonight is going to be on the conservation research, which both Adrian and indeed the MA students sitting on the right here, Simon Goebbler, Simon Goebbler and Geraldine Krauthoiser are working on. We're halfway through the project at the moment and the information you'll get tonight will take note of what's been achieved and what's been found over that six-month period. At the end we will have, I hope, ten minutes for questions. We'll throw the floor open at that point. So if I can begin with some historical context information, the Royal Gallery on the slide we're looking at in the State Departments was the largest of all the rooms in the new Victorian Palace of Westminster, built as we know between the 1840s and the 1860s. And it formed a key part of the grand processional route used by the monarch at State Opening of Parliament. There were 18 large wall compartments arranged on two levels, six on the upper level, 12 on the lower level. And the Fine Arts Commission, headed by Prince Albert, who were in charge of determining which works of art would be picked for which interior, they determined that the theme for the Royal Gallery would be the history of the nation in battle, in other words, celebrating the heroic achievements of the nation in battle. And the two most important battle scenes within Victorian living memory were the Battle of Waterloo and the Battle of Trafalgar, and they were to occupy the largest of the wall compartments at the lower level. Daniel McLeese was selected as the artist to carry out the work. It was the most high profile and significant commission for the entire Palace of Westminster. He had, he was given to understand that he would do all 18 wall compartments, a massive undertaking, and it was the absolute pinnacle of his artistic career. And yet, less than 20 years after he had completed the paintings in the mid-1860s, the biographer William Bates described the last decade of Daniel McLeese's involvement at the Palace as causing dire injury to his health, serious loss to his pocket and bitter disappointment to his expectations. So what happened? McLeese wasn't new to the Houses of Parliament. He'd already completed two wall paintings in the House of Lords of the Vating Chamber, and he'd had to learn the highly disciplined technique of Fresco painting. The paintings on the Royal Gallery were intended to be in Fresco. Fresco was the most noble form of art. The Fine Arts Commissioners felt it highly appropriate for this major public building. McLeese began with the painting of the Battle of Waterloo. The subject chosen was the meeting of Wellington and Bluker, who headed the Prussian forces, at La Belle Alliance after or later on in the battle. And it was a subject that symbolised the Anglo-Prussian alliance, which had finally brought the Napoleonic Wars to a close. McLeese chose to depict the subject after the battle had been fought and won and victory had been assured. He spent a year carrying out very detailed research. He built up all the information on the soldiers' uniforms. He talked to people who had been in the battle. He wanted the action to be believable. He began the cartoon of the large paper drawing of the cartoon in March 1858, and it was put on show in the Royal Gallery in June 1859. The reaction was incredibly positive. His excellent draftsmanship and the ability to work on highly complex compositions were greatly admired. The art journal commented, this is the greatest work of its class that has been produced in England, nor is there any painter of the continent who has surpassed it. When McLeese began a job of painting after the cartoon had got such wonderful praise, he began in July 1859, and Joy very quickly turned to despair. He was deeply unhappy that the level of detail he wanted to include was proving very complex in the medium of fresco. It was so bad that McLeese wanted to pull out of the commission, and he proposed instead painting in oil on canvas, his familiar, his known way of painting. He said that if the paintings were done on canvas on panel, they would look like wall paintings. Prince Albert was not to be moved on the idea, and he's noted as having said, the spot which was to be decorated by painting absolutely requires monumental treatment. He says, he further goes on, a grand historical work requires a sacrifice of the details that McLeese knew he wanted to include. He said fresco is a protection to Mr McLeese against himself, and ensures his rising to a height as an artist, which he cannot himself comprehend as yet. However, it was Prince Albert who proposed the way forward, and he suggested McLeese go to Germany to study the recently developed medium of water glass. The advantage of water glass was that it took away much of the rigid discipline of fresco painting. The painting was finished with amazing speed in December 1861, and contemporary comment was once again highly favourable. The art journal called it the greatest work of its class that has ever been seen in England. Again, looking over to what was happening on the continent, they said, nor is there any painter of the continent who has surpassed it, not even Kallbach. Kallbach was a German painter painting in Berlin at exactly the same period. McLeese then went on to paint the battle of Trafalgar, and that was completed again in water glass and the technique of water glass in late 1865. Only four years later, a few months before McLeese died, at a time when the statues which were gilded stone were going into the Royal Gallery, the art journal came back with its final comment saying, we look eagerly forward to the removal of these unfortunate frescos which year by year blacken on the wall. This would seem a good point to hand over to Professor Adrian Heritage sitting on my right, Professor of Wall Paintings Conservation at Cologne University of Applied Sciences, to tell you more about the exciting project to look at the issues related to the technique and what might be done as part of the collaborative research project. Adrian, thank you very much. My Lords, ladies and gentlemen, it's truly heartening to see a full house such keen interest, but this isn't surprising given the remarkable paintings of Daniel McLeese and the Royal Gallery, because it's a great pleasure this evening to present the research project to you and provide some preliminary results of this work in progress. Although I'm the designated speaker this evening, the two most important members of our team are here on my right, Geraldine Krautweiser and Simon Gabler. Both Geraldine and Simon are qualified diploma conservators graduating from our university in 2009. Since this time they've been working as freelance conservators in Germany. And although they did not feel comfortable to speak tonight in English, they will be answering your questions after my talk. Even before undertaking our quite testing entrance examinations for our diploma course, our students are required to undertake a practical training in conservation. And it's this blending of theory with conservation practice which is so important for us in conservation. So as a result of this I'm very fortunate to have two very capable diploma students who are now available to undertake this research at master's level on the paintings in Westminster. Our approach together with the curator's office is to explore the potential for remedial, that is to say direct treatment such as cleaning, but also to investigate the aesthetic issues with the name of improving the presentation of the two paintings. The first of the two master's projects has been undertaken by Geraldine Krautweiser. McLeese's use of water glass for the Royal Gallery wall paintings within the context of wider development of the technique in Germany, including testing and proposals for conservation. The second theme is being undertaken by Simon. His subject is the assessment of the physical history and surface materials and proposals for the presentation of the Royal Gallery wall paintings and further preventive care. So project one addresses the conservation issues of the McLeese paintings, the physical history, original technique, added altered materials, a condition assessment, together with the conservation treatment and proposals for treatment. And project two addresses the aesthetic issues of the McLeese paintings. Why do they appear as they do today? And to what extent does this result from a failure in their original technique? Or from their physical history? Simon will also be undertaking testing with the aim to optimise the lighting conditions and improve the presentation of the paintings. The MA projects began in March this year and will be finished in March 2013, with myself as first examiner and my colleague Professor Dr Yeagers as second examiner. Professor Yeagers is also supervising the pigment and media analysis together with the students. The structure of my talk is as follows. And although I will try not to skip over important aspects, please forgive me if here and there I don't dwell as you would like or give as many examples as you would like. But I want to provide enough time for you to give questions to the students, possibly myself and Malcolm and Caroline. But I do want to cover a little bit more of the background to the artists in the context of the two paintings. I want to tell you a bit about what is water glass, what is the technique and why did they use it. Something about the physical history and preliminary results and work still to do. Born Daniel McLeese in Cork Island in 1806, the young McLeese began training as a painter and illustrator in the Cork Institute of Arts. In fact against the wishes of his father, he was quite a simple man, a shoe mender. In 1827 he moves to London and enters the Royal Academy Schools. He was immediately successful. Indeed in 1831 he was awarded a gold medal for history painting at the Royal Academy Schools. First in 1835 he begins to spell his name McLeese. His career flourishes and he is quickly immersed in London's cultural scene. In 1839 McLeese paints this portrait of his friend Charles Dickens. The following year McLeese illustrates the odd curiosity shock. I quote from Dante Gabriel Rosetti. I suppose no such series of the portraits of celebrated persons of an epoch produced by an eye and hand of so much insight and power and realised with such a view to the actual impression of the sitter exists anywhere. This was posthumous praise from Rosetti following the death of McLeese in 1870. However I should point out that Marian Evans, better known as George Elliott, said that this portrait of Dickens suffered from odious beautification. The fact of the matter was that McLeese was popular. He was a popular painter and illustrator and hence much in demand. But it is McLeese's talents as a history painter that came to the attention of Prince Albert. It was William Dice who recommended McLeese to Prince Albert as the best painter to undertake the history frescoes in the new palace of Westminster. Here I show you the two monumental murals and the Royal Gallery. The meeting of Wellington and Blucca after the Battle of Waterloo completed in 1861 and the death of Nelson at Trafalgar completed in 1865. In 1841, following the appointment of a select committee to promote the fine arts of Britain in connection with the rebuilding of the house of the parliament, the fine arts commissioners appointed to direct the commission and production of works at Westminster. As Malcolm Hayes said, Prince Albert is president. Sir Charles Eastlake is secretary to the commission. Eastlake was later appointed first keeper of the National Gallery as you know in 1843. The commission intended that history painting would be commissioned. And they wanted these paintings to be executed as Malcolm has said in the noblest of arts fresco. As Vasari called it, the manly art of fresco painting. In 48 McLeese is contracted to undertake the spirit of chivalry fresco in the House of Lords. And this was followed by the spirit of justice again in fresco technique the following year. The commissioning process was complicated and distressing for the artists involved. And McLeese had to push hard to gain the contract for the Royal Gallery murals. Nonetheless, as an example of McLeese's standing in 1858 he has commissioned to paint 18 history paintings of British history in the Royal Gallery for a sum of £23,000. He didn't get all of them. These paintings, Waterloo and Trafalgar, designed to fill the large central spaces in the Royal Gallery, were the only paintings completed and paid for under the contract. In 1864 the fine arts commission was dissolved following the death of Prince Albert in 1861. McLeese must have been exhausted. Seven years of work in the Royal Gallery he withdrew from many social engagements much to the annoyance of Dickens. And he dedicated his time to completing these two monumental works. The disappointment of being set from completing the commission was difficult for him to come to Townsville. And McLeese died five years later in 1870 at the age of 64. If we look at the aesthetic qualities of these paintings McLeese was not a great colours. The strengths lay in brilliant draftsmanship which was enthusiastically praised by his contemporaries. But also in his narrative and composition which was often undervalued by some of his contemporary critics. On completion of the Royal Gallery murals they were generally well received. Both Waterloo and Trafalgar are not comfortable views of history but immensely powerful narrative statements. From McLeese's inclusion of heroic women and heroic black sailors aboard the victory to the inclusion of heroic Irishmen and Highlanders at Waterloo. These were not the products of a received contemporary English view but rather an intelligent, brave and intensely personal statement by McLeese, an Irish immigrant of Scottish descent. Before continuing let us take a few minutes to look at a detail from Waterloo. More gory than glory. This is not merely a representation of a famous victory but a depiction of carnage and terror of battle and loss of life on both sides. The attention to detail is extreme and meticulously of research by McLeese. I quote from Major Fry's contemporary account recorded at the battlefield on 22 June 1815. This morning I went to visit the field of battle which is a little beyond the village of Waterloo on the plateau of Mont Saint-Jean. But on arrival there the sight was too horrible to behold. I felt sick to the stomach and was obliged to return. The multitude of carcasses, the heaps of wounded men with mangled limbs unable to move and perishing from not having their wounds dressed or from hunger. Formed a spectacle I shall never forget. The wounded, both of the Allies and the French, remain in an equally deplorable state. As Richard Orman put it in his 1968 article on Daniel McLeese in the Burlington magazine, Wellington and Blucca shake in hands above the twisted bodies of dead and wounded are not conquering heroes but grim survivors. Before proceeding to tell you about the water glass technique of painting, first I show you this example detail of Waterloo illustrating I think the aesthetic issues with the paintings in their current state and with their current lighting. McLeese's paintings were reported to be in a poor condition only matter in only years after they were first painted. The perception at the time was that there had been a failure of original technique, however water glass can be an excellent painting method and was used successfully at Westminster by Ward and Cope for the mule paintings in the corridors of central lobby. As a means of contrast, here the medello in quarter size for the death of Nelson at Trafalgar, now in the Warpy Gallery, Liverpool. Albeit executed in the much more luminous oil painting technique it gives perhaps some impression of how the colouration might have been 151 years ago. The oil painting is a very large finished study however the dimensions of the Royal Gallery paintings are vast in total 100 square metres of highly detailed painting. Here the location of the Westminster paintings in their architectural context under the windows of the Royal Gallery. The wall construction is stone ashlar facing on brick. The plaster is not attached directly to the brick but onto a wooden lava construction with an air gap between this and the exterior wall. The intention was to help to isolate the painting from the damp exterior wall. As mentioned above, the fine art commission wanted all the murals to be undertaken in fresco because of the longevity and monumentality of the fresco technique as perfected in Italy. Organic materials such as oils and glues would darken and deteriorate in the damp environment and were considered inferior to fresco. Under this instruction, Maclees begins painting in the Royal Gallery in fresco. The fresco technique proves troublesome and after just one month he wants to give up. On the advice of Prince Albert, Maclees undertakes a study taught at Berlin Munich and Dresden to research the water glass technique of painting. So why did Maclees move away from fresco for the Royal Gallery paintings? Well, blonde fresco or good fresco needs to be executed on wet or damp plaster to ensure that the painting, the pigments are bound in a calcium carbonate matrix. This means that there's very limited timed paint before the plaster becomes dry and the paint no longer adheres to the plaster. Here we see the most famous example of fresco painting by Michelangelo. Here the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican. In blonde fresco painting the design is painted in small individual portions of plaster called guianato. Anything larger would result in the plaster drying before completion and the pigments would not be adequately bound. In contrast, water glass could be painted on a single layer of dry plaster and the amount of time it took to paint any single part was no longer an issue. I quote from Maclees's detailed technical report on water glass painting. He first mentions fresco. A very small portion of these details could only be painted on the fresh laid plaster each day in the old fresco process and therefore in the progress of the work would necessitate innumerable joinings of the plaster and give rise to such complicated and minute cuttings that it would not be possible to get a mason to execute them. While the ground for a painting in stereochromie, water glass, is laid all at once and the work can be left and resumed at pleasure. Taking nothing away from the beauty and power of Michelangelo's frescoes, the fresco technique was not best suited to the demands for detail and accuracy expected for the Victorian painters. This comparison of details from the Michelangelo in fresco and Maclees in stereochromie shows I think the difference in detail. I quote from TJ Gullock. The Italian religious painter worked in absolute independence of many historical facts and details. He chose whatever scenes and draperies he pleased, he painted directly for the imagination. But modern antiquarian research has made us all so critical that if an artist nowadays were to treat many historical themes as they might have been treated by a painter, he would run great risk of being laughed at. Maclees was given no such opportunity for fanciful imagination. For example, even Nelson's hat and costume were the original items supplied to Maclees as an authentic source for his painting. Water glass. Despite the Irish collection with Maclees, this has nothing to do with Waterford glass. Water glass was developed in Germany and first produced by the chemist and mineralogist Dr Johann Neppermock Fuchs in 1818. Interestingly, its first major commercial use was as a fire retardant for fabrics and wood. Hence Maclees is paid to undertake a study trip to Germany together with Lady Eastlake as translator to research the stereochrome technique of painting using water glass to fix the pigments. In 1846, the chemist Fuchs, together with the painter Joseph Schlothauer, had developed in Munich a painting technique based on water glass which they called stereochrome. From the Greek stereos for solid, fixed or firm and chroma, colour and stereochrome meaning enduring colour. In this stereochrome technique the pigments are applied in pure distilled water to dry plaster. After the painting is complete, the area is fixed by spraying the liquid glass on the surface of the plaster and undrying the pigments abound in a fast, silicate matrix. Undrying the previously soluble solution becomes insoluble. Dr Pettencoffer of Munich was the leading chemist involved with water glass following the death of Fuchs in 1856. It was this new technique developed first in Munich and then used elsewhere in Germany, most notably in the Neuer Museum in Berlin, which Prince Albert promoted and led to Macleese's study visit in 1859. Herewith, one of the earliest surviving examples of stereochrome, er painting sorry, Philip Foltes's Nymphen-Daschtelung dating from 1851 in Feldathen, Roseninsel, southern Germany. This is recorded by Gerard in a recent visit to Germany. In a letter to Macleese dating 19 of November 1859, Pettencoffer recommends that only potassium water glass should be used. The other option would have been sodium water glass. Macleese had the material samples of both types of water glass and other equipment necessary for the application on the wall sent from London to Munich. Macleese was very keen to know how to apply the water glass fixative. May not the water glass be applied with a soft brush in the fixing process, Macleese asks. Her delits reply is nine, translated as no. The syringe alone is to be used and carefully so that the water glass be equal everywhere. Among the materials and equipment sent to London was a water glass sprinkler represented here with a glass flask to hold the water glass and a pump action. Which by all accounts was very tiring to use. Indeed Pettencoffer had recommended the use of a foot operated bellows sprinkler which was sent to London but Macleese reported the instrument has after all not arrived. It should be noted that the palace was still under construction and the conditions for painting were not ideal. Macleese complained of the dampness, dust, salt, uneven light from the windows, workmen above him on ladders with buckets of beer. To quote Macleese himself on the conditions in the Royal Gallery at the time. Worst of all, the place is a perfect carpenter shop. Royal Gallery, I know the architect had much pride in it. Royal Lumber Room is a fitter name for it. The plastering was undertaken under Macleese's direction and the quality of the finish is more regular but coarser on the later Trafalgar's painting, indicating that the plastering of Waterloo was not wholly to his satisfaction and that improvements were sought after the experience of completing the first painting. This inorganic technique, Waterglass, was preferable to the organic binders, a secco that is on dry plaster. As mentioned earlier, organic materials like glues, oils, waxes etc. are more prone to deterioration on the wall than silicate or quartz which is the same material as flint or the sand in the plaster. Macleese was fastidious in respect to his research into the technique of stereopriming. Above and beyond his direct instruction on research in Germany, on his return to London, Macleese undertook numerous tests and further correspondence with his German advisors. He seemed to have adapted or better said refined the technique into a sort of glazing technique with little or no attempt to create a pasta or structure with the paint layer. Theoretically, this means that he would have needed very little Waterglass to bind the pigments he had applied. Here in this watercolour by the Scottish artist John Ballantyne, we see Macleese at work on his raised platform, his assistant grinding his pigments in water. Perhaps the eagle-eyed among you can see a certain contraption carefully positioned among his painting materials and equipment. Here we have the Waterglass Sprintler used to spray the liquid glass on the pigments to fix the pigments permanently to the plaster. An important aspect of the student research is an assessment of the physical history of the paintings. Here is an example of the lighting issues from the archive. We feel it our duty to remark that working in the Royal Gallery has proved disadvantageous to Mr Macleese, both as regards the execution of and the ultimate effect of his paintings. The reader will best realise this, what these disadvantages are and have been, if he goes to see the artist's pictures on a sunny day. He will then have his pleasure somewhat diminished by finding several very beautiful but entirely inappropriate colours vaguely creeping over the picture. This is attributable to the picture being lit by the rays which pass through a stained glass. But a more serious disadvantage is the blinding general glare from the windows above the pictures and from which it is impossible to escape when at the proper point of station for viewing such large works. Gallic informs us that it was the avowed intention of the late prince consort to recommend that the emblazoned windows should be done away and let light in from the roof onto the pictures. As we've heard, we eagerly look forward to the removal of these unfortunate frescoes. The tragedy for Macleese was that not only was his contract drastically reduced, although it seems he was handsomly played for his lavers on Waterloo and Trafalgar. He would have earned considerably more money taking portrait commissions in that time, and furthermore the permanence of his work, that is to say his technique, is now in question, a year before his death. It's no wonder that Paul Mann died in 1870. An account from TSR Boats, published in 1990, is based on many detailed contemporary records in the Westminster archive, and it begins, There remains for consideration the work of Macleese in the Royal Gallery, the two huge wall paintings of Wellington's meeting with Blucca and the death of Nelson. The colours are darkened and there is a heavy film of dirt on their surfaces. Unshielded radiators beneath the central groups had blackened the focal points. The frescoes early showed some mildew growth and have received hard treatment. Some error in the use of silicate led to minute flaking, so that they are covered with small white spots that give a grayish appearance to the whole. The scheme for the room has never been completed, so that the long dark rectangles have an ill-placed effect and the light that they require is obscured by the stained glass windows of which Macleese complained, yet by any standard they remain major works. To quote Professor Church, the chemist and adviser to the government, The increased and increasing consumption of coal in London and the greater licence allowed to the gas companies in the matter of freeing their gas from sulphur compounds must result in a serious augmentation of sulphuric acid in the air of the metropolis. It is this acid which constitutes the chief destructive agency at work on pictorial and other artistic productions. Earlier, from the volume 3 of the new palace of Westminster from 1878, I quote, The decay in the case of Waterloo showed itself by an effervescence which spread itself over the whole surface of the picture and towards the close of 1874 the picture was subjected to chemical treatment under the superintendence of Mr Richmond RA, apparently with success. There followed a series of treatments first from Mr Richmond with silk dusters and warm water. In 1888, cleaning with an air blast from bellows. In 1894, the examination by Professor Church, he recommended cleaning by flicking the entire surface with pads of cotton wool enclosed in soft linen handkerchiefs and sponging with an abundance of distilled water. In 1897, again cleaning by air blast, careful dusting and using a so-called breadcrumb distributor and an application of paraffin wax. The paraffin wax was driven into the plaster by heat using a flame gun. These treatments continued into the 20th century with applications of beeswax on both the paintings in the 1930s. Now I think you begin to understand the present condition of these paintings as a result of their history. We have undertaken related investigations. An inspection of McLeese's cartoons for the Battle of Waterloo was kindly arranged by colleagues of the Royal Academy and we were privileged to inspect the cartoons on June 19 this year at an RA storage facility together with their conservators and exhibitions curator Dr Luck. Lord Luke was able to join us and we were very grateful for the opportunity to see these incredible artworks. Conservator Emma Cox produced a very useful conservation report on the cartoons. McLeese's draftmanship is breathtaking. Following the exhibition of the cartoons, he was given a gold port crayon by his fellow artists as a token of their admiration. You can see why his fellow artists were so impressed. The attention to detail is quite staggering. Military uniforms, headwear, musical instruments, horse tackle and so on all carefully researched with Prince Albert providing specific advice in respect to Blufus Prussian forces. In 1718 French surgeon Jean-Louis Petit developed a screw device or tourniquet for occluding blood flow in surgical sites. In the cartoon we see here a soldier with a tourniquet positioned on his shoulder where it could not work. This technical mistake was spotted and corrected for the final painting. However if you look at the finished painting here using infrared reflectography to show the underdrawing, interestingly the tourniquet as depicted in the painting is correctly positioned. This is just one of thousands of details in the paintings. Here I also give you an example of an authentic Petit tourniquet. Albeit mounted in the wrong position in the cartoon, the surgical apparatus is drawing incredible detail. The correct position on the arm in the final painting is most probably undertaken on the advice of McLeese's own brother Joseph, a surgeon, who was apparently also an excellent craftsman. Nancy Weston in her absorbing book, Daniel McLeese, Irish artist in Victorian London sits out the political and social context for the imagery used by McLeese and Waterloo in other works. In Waterloo we find a commentary on Irish British history and not least his own personal experience as a proud Irishman of Presbyterian Scottish descent living in London. McLeese jokingly called himself a corconian cockney. The soldier with the tourniquet as depicted in the cartoon becomes a piper in the painting with his pipes at his side and wearing a red and green coat. This is an Irishman. If we look just below where he's been shot are his tattoos between the union flag and the George Rex's initials is a shamrock. This is an Irish hero loyal to Ireland and the Crown, one of the many Irish heroes depicted in Waterloo. The most significant of these is Wellington himself, whom McLeese and his fellow Irishman laid playing as their man. Here are a few insights into the work the students are currently undertaking. Among the first tasks were to undertake an in-situ survey of the original technique and to investigate what materials have been added. Minute samples have been taken from the paintings and the results of various analyses will provide us with an improved knowledge about the original and added materials and of the deterioration processes. Likewise, a survey of the condition of the paintings has been undertaken by the students. This survey using CAD software allows you to quantify the exact amounts of damage. Other investigations include detailed photography, including rathing-like photography. Here a detail from Trafalgar showing the grade areas of deterioration. This close-up image of the Trafalgar painting surface in rathing-like shows how the plaster is flat, but the texture is very granular. Video microscopy reveals the nature of the painting surface and its condition. The microscopy shows the whitish upper surface of the sand grains, which are no longer covered with pigment. This is the speckled effect which was noted in 1900. This may in part be due to a failure in the fixing, but equally early cleaning treatments may be responsible for removing the pigment from these areas. Here we also have an example of ultraviolet fluorescence imaging to help show the added coatings and other phenomena. Again, ultraviolet imaging shows the extensive retouching, mainly on the Waterloo painting. Infrared reflectography can be used to penetrate the darkened surface materials and paint layer to reveal any carbon-based underdrawing which may be present. Remarkably, on the later Trafalgar painting seen here, there is no evidence for preliminary drawing. Indeed, there was no cartoon produced for this work. We know that McLeese used models and original items on the scaffold when painting. Here one can see finely painted strengthening of particular passages of painting. These may be the type of corrective painting added by McLeese on top of the fixed painting, a question mark. It is very precise and different to the cruder retouching found elsewhere on the painting. Here an example in greater detail, strengthening of the striped trouser material. Here one can appreciate the level of detail and the painted materials and textures within the painting. The Trafalgar painting has no evidence for underdrawing or squaring up at all. Let us contrast this with the extensive underdrawing found on the Waterloo painting. By contrast here, this painting transferred from a cartoon probably by inserting a piece of charcoal-covered paper under the cartoon and tracing through, just like you do with carbon paper. Pentimenti or corrections made by McLeese can also be observed. By the way, this is the painting, not the cartoon. This is the underdrawing that we can see here using infrared reflectography. You can also see later crude retouching here, visible in this image. Here the latest preliminary results to the materials that we found. Plaster, lime plaster, but also gypsum, that we did not expect. Waterglass, small traces of potassium, but very little. Pigments, this is a work in progress, but the pigments range also to typical 19th century pigments. There are resins and coatings on the paintings. There's the wax paraffin coating I mentioned, there's beeswax, and there's chlorides present from the cleaning probably from the cleaning in 1963. There's also shellac on the paintings, but not on all of the painting. We have no results yet for the greying areas I showed you on the Trafalb painting. Finally, I show you potential for improvement to the paintings through changing lighting. In this simple example, the colour temperature has changed to daylight illumination. This provides a much more satisfactory colour balance, and further testing will be undertaken in this campaign by Zeeman Gable. Just by shining a different light on the paintings, as simple as that. I would just like to thank my colleagues, Lord Luke, and colleagues from the Royal Academy, also conservators Kate Coder and Elizabeth Wooley. Thank you very much, and we're open to questions from you. Adrian, thank you very much. You've covered a wide area indeed. We've now got ten minutes or thereabouts for questions, and we've got those that are sitting round the table. The microphones will now work if you want to raise a question, because we're filming, if you could begin by saying your name and then the question. For those that aren't at the main table, Sue, standing in the corner with the roving microphone, will come round and will work it that way. Any questions, Lord? I don't think I need a microphone, I've caught you over what you are now. I've understood that the main problem with any sort of lighting is that you have a bad effect on the pictures. Can you give us a little more on that, and where the compromise leads you in the recommendation? Yes, okay. Mule paintings, fresco or water glass, requires a very alkaline environment, so it means it's quite a harsh painting technique for pigments. That means that the selection of pigments typically means that you don't use pigments that fade easily or are very sensitive to light. There are other examples of paintings where lake pigments, for example, have been used and they have faded due to the light. But these pigments are not susceptible really to light damage, to UV damage. I'm normally a problem, by the way. I have a very early struggle, so that's a non problem. In that sense, it's not a problem, but damp is a bigger problem, condensation events are bigger problems with pigments, that can change the nature of the pigments more. But not so much the UV. I think it's more of a question really of the light, this dappled light that comes through the stained glass, for example, that Maclees complained about. That's more of an issue, and of course the rather warm lighting of the present lighting within the room. But thank you, it's a good question because of course that's an issue that is... I think that's what we've heard. Well, it's a problem for oil paintings in museums or watercolours where these paintings are more delicate. Any more questions? Christine Salmond Persall from the House Lords. Am I right in thinking that when the first painting was being completed, or rather, sorry, when the second one was being started it was already noted that the first one was deteriorating. Is that right? I suppose my question is one that can't be answered, it's due with the humanity of the situation. How could Maclees have the stamina to continue with the second painting whilst witnessing the deterioration of the first painting? I know, it sounds a little bit strange, but shall I answer that? Is that better? I think the issue here is we need to take a few steps back. When Maclees was painting the Nelson painting, the Waterloo painting had been boxed in, so one couldn't see it for a number of years. The early signs of efflorescence, it's quite typical to have that sort of efflorescence, this sort of salts appearing on the surface in water glass technique. So I think they would have expected that to be just a teathing problem, something that could be brushed off, salts that could be brushed off and wouldn't be such a problem. It's later, after the initial cleanings I think, and if you imagine also boxing in a painting isn't necessarily so good in terms of an environmental microclimate, because if you remember to the report which mentions mildew appearing on the paintings etc. So I think you've got all of that early history which was really bad luck for Maclees, but I don't think he would have thought it was a problem with the technique necessary at that stage. Helen Valentine, Royal Academy of Arts. I was just interesting if you could enlarge at all about how you think he went about painting for instance the Wellington and Blutcher picture, because you say that you haven't found evidence of under drawing at all? On the Wellington, yes. So there's no evidence? Yes, on the Wellington, yes. The one we have the cartoon for, we have the transfer. Yes, but what about the other one? On the Nelson Trafford we don't. Do you want to, I'd love you to say something. Have a go. No, we haven't found any under drawing on the surface also from Nelson, that's what Nelson painting, and only on the other one on the Wellington and Blutcher. So do you have any ideas how he would have worked on this? Yes, my personal view is that he was such a talented draftsman that he could work from a sketch or from, you know, some of the elements for example are things like the ropes and the various elements he would have had with him on the scaffold definitely. We couldn't find, also with some of the larger diagonals on the victory, we couldn't find any indication of pencil indentations, any sorts of preparatory techniques at all. That doesn't mean to say they're not there, but they're not visible in infrared and they're not visible with a microscope. That painting is 50 square metres of painting, so it could be at the end of our project that we'll say we found something and the key. He was a very talented draftsman and quite how he did it I don't know. I wondered about things like projection or something, camera obscura or something like that for some of it. But we expect to see some painting. It could be that he painted it, you know, in terms of Aleprima. Oh, Tim Redmond, I work in the Department of Information Services here in Parliament. I was actually at the Walker Gallery in Liverpool last week, so I saw McLeese's oil painting of the death of Nelson. But in the same room, very close by, is Benjamin West's portrayal of exactly the same scene and titled The Death of Nelson. I have a sneaky suspicion that McLeese took a lot of his ideas for The Death of Nelson from Benjamin West's painting, because Benjamin West was painted in the 1820s, so only 20 years after The Death of Nelson. And there are a lot of really strong similarities, particularly in the positioning of the main characters with McLeese's. It's interesting you say that because McLeese was sort of forth through Benjamin West's version of the depiction of Trafalgar. He was forced to place Nelson above death and not below death. And McLeese would have known that. He'd obviously done all the research. But because it was sort of this image of Nelson on board in the painting by West, et cetera, particularly the painting of West, he was forced to create that in accuracy. So I think you're certainly right that it was a major influence, but certainly it was the influence that caused that major inaccuracy in the painting, because nobody would have accepted a painting of Nelson below death. It's worthwhile pointing out to the involvement of the Fine Arts Commission, and the Fine Arts Commission had a variety of expertise. They had the historian Lord Macaulay, they had others who would have been very closely involved in the design of both paintings that McLeese is working on. So there was quite a lot of influence that he would have been given, he would have been told about, and which he would have had to incorporate in his designs. My name's Catherine. I'll work for the Department of Information too. So, Ms Tim, how do you think Daniel McLeese would have felt today if he was here in this room 150 years later, finding out his results? Yeah, it's a really good question, and I'm going to throw it over to my students, but I just want to say thank you very much, because you're one of the people who came and asked this question when we were working. So thank you very much. This is for some examples, and then I tried to compare the two McLeese paintings and the examples I found in Germany, and the quality of the McLeese paintings. It's really wonderful. So I know that now, and I think he can be proud of it. McLeese was devastated at what happened about the paintings, and I mentioned earlier that this was the high point of his entire career, and he was offered other commissions, for example, St Stephen's Hall, the paintings there, and he turned it down knowing and hoping that he would be given the task of doing the paintings in the wrong gallery. We had only seven years, and we had the water painting, and then the great Nazi painting. He's been vindicated in a minute. He's been vindicated after 150 years. I see it. These paintings are in a terrific condition, in a very good condition, actually. This is what we found so far. The plaster is in good condition. We've stood bomb damage at least to the fenestration from the Second World War. There's some minor cracks caused by that, but no failure of the plastering technique. There's no great flaking of the paint layer, et cetera, et cetera. We hope the presentation of the paintings can be improved, but it's more the treatment with the wax and the various wax treatments, et cetera, and all these things that, of course, have led to the damage. They can't have known in 1874 that by adding water to the surface would have mobilised any salts that were present and caused even more efflorescence. They can't have known that by adding any organic coating to the paintings would have also pick up the dirt and debris and darken the paintings. All of these things were mistakes that were made early on, so Paul McLeese was blamed, but it wasn't him. After all, he was forced to use this technique. I prefer to think that he was bold enough to introduce this technique, which I understand Herbert tried to really take from him and say that he had brought the technique to England. Anyway, I think he went out to Germany, he looked at the technique, he researched it, and it's probably in a better condition than most of the examples in Germany. If not all of them, that's yet to be fully researched. Perhaps one final question? Caroline Shenton from the Parliamentary Archives. Apologies if I missed this. I'm not clear how common the water glass technique actually was in Germany and elsewhere, and perhaps how long it went on for in the 19th century. Could you let us say that? Oh yes, there's a development of the water glass technique in Germany, but I'll leave it to you. Dylan Wickliffe, on the other hand, is a kind. Ah, okay, yes. So Mr Fuchs was the... The invented bit. And he said for this kind of a stereo chromium, and this was in a time between 1847, and this was the time when the first painting was created in Berlin from Mr Carverbach, and then he died, and then Pettenkoffer came, and in the 1870s, 17, in the middle of the 1870s, so Adolf Wilhelm Kein, he was also in German chemistry. He tried to make some modifications with this technique. That means he made modifications with the binder and with the pigments, so that the problems for the fixing of the paint layer were more... There were less problems with the technique. And this was the beginning of the so-called mineral painting in Germany, or the Kein colours. So it was around for about 40 years or so? No, Kein painting then really took off. So the first sort of 30 years or so was this first stereo chromium, based on Fuchs and then Pettenkoffer. But it's really after Kein, 1870, 1871, around that sort of time, that it really takes off this mineral painting with Kein farbent, and they're still used today, and you can still paint with that today, and you see lots of examples also then later examples in the 1920s and 30s throughout the Netherlands and then expanding into France, etc. So that was very popular, but this was more restricted really to high quality commissions. OK, if we can perhaps draw to a close the lecture tonight, and if I can thank very much Professor Adrian Heritage and both Simon Gebler and Geraldine Krauthoiser for their sterling work. As we've said, it's work in progress. We're now halfway through the year, and we hope very much that by the end of the year we'll have the opportunity to hold a similar lecture and give you even more good news and the potential for what may be possible to bring back the pleased and glorious paintings.