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The sinuous lines and the colors of Donald Judd break into the ICA, Institute of Contemporary Art, of Miami in a new guise, after the important restoration that allowed the display to the public of 14 rare paintings in absolute first vision, which are to be added, in the work Untitled, 6 July 1964 in light cadmium, galvanized iron and red enamel, on display for a limited period,. The intervention was implemented by Art Care Conservation, a renowned art studio based in Miami, New York and Los Angeles. In addition to taking care of the cleaning and restoration of the works of art, Art Care Conservation deals with the evaluation of small, medium and large works of art through technical examinations of paintings, which include but are not limited to chemical analysis, microscopic, ultraviolet fluorescence and infrared photography. The analysis allows to establish the progressive decay of the work of art over time, preventing the emergency for a treatment and prolonging the longevity of the work of art, making sure that, especially during the purchase phase, the estimation of the timing and maintenance process may be given the right value .
Art Care Conservation has restored important works of art, including: the Persian Mural of the Elling O. Foundation, works by Salvador Dali at the Dali Museum in St. Petersburg, the Hollis Holbrook Mural at the University of Florida, the Tiffany Chapel and the painting The Domes of the Yosemite by Albert Bierstadt at the Morse Museum in Saint Petersburg, and the mural by Keith Haring at the LGBT Center in New York.
Without the restoration process the works would not have been otherwise visible due to the damage related to the weather and to the poor conditions of framing, which were solved through specific cleaning techniques and the filling of the spaces behind the painting by insertion and interlocking of special panels.
The works, exhibited at the ICA in Miami, were painted by Donald Judd during his stay in the Downtown Manhattan studio, between 1959 and 1961. The inauguration of the exhibition took place in the presence of Rustin Levenson, president and founder of Art Care Conservation which explained the focal points of the intervention through the representation of images concerning the pre and post intervention.
The works, of strong emotional impact, with obvious corrections are mostly oil, acrylic and sand, and represent the transition period of Donald Judd from the figurative art to abstract compositions up to the sculpture of large-scale works, for which he is mostly remembered today.
In the paintings of Donald Judd, the reference to Minimalism is explicit and inevitable, a movement he didn’t identify with, but his attention to geometric shapes and colors such as dense red cadmium, white, gray and blue, seem to take shape by combining elements of painting and sculpture, to which he will move concentrating his work in space and with space, thus working on the three dimensions for the next thirty years.
