It comes as no surprise that the "massive renovation" of the Picasso museum in Paris should have cost twice as much and taken more than twice as long as estimated (Report, 5 March). It comes as no surprise that the architect should celebrate his own renovation as a "development" of spaces that "respects" the listed 17th-century building. Nor is it a surprise that during the building's five-year renovation the contents – Picasso's works – should have been shuttled around the world to raise money to pay for the escalating building work.
What comes as a truly horrible surprise is that all of Picasso's 5,000 works have been "cleaned, restored and reframed" for the opening. It beggars belief that some urgent "conservation" necessity should have struck all of these modern works at the same time. We can only conclude that Picasso's art has been cosmetically spruced-up to match the new decor. The consequence is that all of these works have been severed at the same historical moment and to the same prevailing taste from their previous and likely varying states of conservation or non-conservation. When individual works in a collection are restored and returned to view it is possible to compare them fairly and critically with previously restored and non-restored works. The administrators of this museum have removed that possibility of appraisal at a stroke. We must hope that proper records – including high-quality, directly comparative photographs – were made during the treatment of each work, and that these will be made available to interested parties.
Michael Daley from the Guardian
Director, ArtWatch UK
Director, ArtWatch UK
Malc says I wonder if they have sorted out the eye problems, now an eye on each side!
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