Montreal Museum of Fine Arts | Backs that speak

Painters have always played with the support of their art. When a portrait does not please them, they cover it up by painting something else. We saw it with the painting of Edgar Degas portrait of a woman, from the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia. A woman hiding another under the paint.

Alain Roberge
The Press

Eric Clement
The Press

Artists, and their representatives (gallery owners, art dealers), have also often added elements to works. Numbers, signatures, seals, labels or notes that shed light on the work and on the artist.

For example, many backs of paintings have arrows to indicate the direction of their presentation or special instructions. Like the famous red triangles on the back of Dutch paintings which signified their historical importance and therefore to be protected as a priority in case of danger.

The reverse side of a painting is often crucial when evaluating it. The information it contains can make it possible to confirm the origin of the work, to know its course, the names of its successive owners. To also discover stamps of merchants who have owned it or chalk inscriptions that correspond to auction lot numbers.

Museums and galleries are therefore attentive to what accompanies (sometimes discreetly) the work of art. When the MMFA welcomes a painting into its collection, the restoration team and the curator who chose it assess its condition to find out if it needs repairs.

“For old paintings, we examine them under ultraviolet and infrared light to determine, for example, if there has been any retouching,” says Richard Gagnier, head of the MMFA’s Works of Art Restoration Service. It is a technical analysis of the work and its condition. “Because the report we receive from the art dealer is sometimes not complete,” adds Mary-Dailey Desmarais, the museum’s chief curator. It is often too general. »

Once the inspection is done, we take note of everything that is behind the painting or on the frame. “For some works, you can see the stamps from the exhibitions where they were shown,” says Stéphane Aquin. The director general of the MMFA adds that the Italian artist Rosalba Carriera even hid santini (small religious prints) within the framework of her paintings.

Both sides

Sometimes, we discover that the picture is double! As in the case of an MMFA canvas painted by Canadian artist Henrietta Mabel May (Westmount, 1884-Vancouver, 1971). On the battery side, there is View from my studio window, University Streetand face side, Winter landscape, a sketch on which a label identifying the work made it possible to know that the two oils on wood were painted in 1928.

The case of a recto-verso has also been observed with the small portrait of Maria Soetens painted on copper around 1670 by the Dutch artist Caspar Netscher. The back shows the coat of arms of the Soetens family.

Do the elements that can be found on the back of the canvases add value to the work? “Sometimes,” says Mary-Dailey Desmarais. If we find a love letter or something else that adds to the story of the work, it enriches it. “If there is an indication that the work belonged to a large collection, without giving it an increased market value, that adds added value,” says Richard Gagnier.

But more often than not, they are clues to the provenance of the work. Like the quality of the framing wood. “For old European paintings, if it’s poplar, we’ll know that it comes more from southern Europe, like Italy, whereas in the north, we worked more with oak,” says Richard Gagnier . Moreover, the way in which the stretcher that stretches the canvas was made allows the work to be dated, unless it has been reframed.

Contemporary works of art can also have interesting reverse sides. Descriptions on the back of a work are sometimes intended to explain how to place it, such as The Press saw it recently. On the back of an installation element Set #6, by Claude Tousignant, exhibited (until August 13) at the Maison de la culture Marie-Uguay, we see the layout plan of the elements of the work.

Some artists sometimes describe, on the back of their creations, the materials used to make the work. These details make it easier for restorers when it comes time to make touch-ups.