Series editors' preface - Wood Tools

242 Conservation of Furniture
lead developments in activities such as collections
management and conservation. The
frequent reference to institutional needs in this
chapter is not intended to exclude those
working privately but to provide a benchmark
for all those involved in caring for our
heritage.
6.1.2 Use versus preservation
Many collections, both institutional and
private, constitute finite groups of objects that
have been built up over long periods of time
which are, for practical purposes, irreplaceable.
These collections are required to be used
but equally must be preserved for future
generations. We often seem to expect each
individual object to last forever and yet to be
continually used and re-used. Clearly, objects
cannot last forever. It is therefore important for
all those involved in the use and the maintenance
of these non-renewable resources to
understand how to get the best out of their
objects and how to look after them so that
they will last as long as possible. It is therefore
necessary to understand how objects are
used, what it is about them which is important,
how they may be changed or damaged
during use and how this change can be
minimized. Conservators are expected to have
detailed knowledge in this area but they can
add to their effectiveness by being able to
communicate their knowledge in realistic and
meaningful fashion to others who require
understanding but less detailed knowledge.
Collections may be used in many ways, but
there are two general approaches to the use
of public collections. In one the objects remain
stationary and people come to them and in
the other the objects themselves are moved. It
is important to understand that the lives of
objects are dynamic. For objects to be useful
they must be used. This is especially true for
objects in public collections. Despite the often
mausoleum like atmosphere in museums they
are in fact, at least as far as their objects are
concerned, extremely busy places. To meet
the requirement to give access to the public,
objects are displayed in galleries, study rooms
and stores, loaned to exhibitions,
photographed for publication subjected to
scientific examination and actively used for
lecturing and teaching. These activities require
a continual cycle of handling and moving.
Ways in which the potentially harmful effects
of this activity can be minimized are presented
below in the section on handling.
We do not keep objects just because they
are ‘beautiful’ but because of the information
they contain, because they are documents in
their own right. Some information is available
in the form of photographs, catalogues and
labels, and these are very important. However,
objects themselves contain a great deal of
information that may not be available
elsewhere. If an object is lost this is lost with
it. Much of this information – texture, colour,
shape, decoration, patterns and so forth may
be immediately obvious on the surface. There
may also be traces of pigment or there may
be tool marks – small traces that may only be
visible upon very careful inspection. In some
cases information is only revealed by scientific
examination. A lot of this information is on or
in the surface of the object and it is the surface
that is, unfortunately, the part most likely to
get damaged.
Change and damage
Where the majority of the information is on
the surface of the object, a small amount of
damage or loss could result in the loss of a
great deal of information. Also, a small amount
of damage may result in the remaining information
being distorted. We have therefore to
be very careful about how we care for our
collections because we might inadvertently
lose the whole purpose of an individual part
of our collection or a whole collection.
The risks associated with moving objects are
in general familiar; objects may interact with
each other, with the people doing the moving,
or with the building, transport or equipment
used. Inherent risks to the objects range from
knocks and abrasions to total loss. The risks
of just leaving objects at rest may not be so
obvious but changes will take place very
slowly, which may alter the way the objects
can be used. The way in which objects will
react to either being left alone or being moved
will depend very much on the materials they
are made of and the way they were originally
constructed.
One way to preserve our objects would be
to bury them deep underground hermetically
sealed in thick, dark, inert containers from