Art Conservation in India ...Meet Madhavi and Venkat Singh ... of Dharohar Art Conservation

If you are an Art Collector ... or a Connoisseur of Art ... well! than I am pretty sure you are going to be absolutely delighted to meet Madhavi and Venkat Singh of Dharohar Art Conservation ... today in India , they are the most experienced private art conservators ... who treat every type of artifacts ... and have an experience of more than fifteen years doing restoration of art works ... their repertoire of conservation reads out some of the finest art collections ... I can go on and on ranting off about their work ...
o.k, so to continue the ranting ... ;) ... here's a piece I am absolutely in love with ....

' Lakshmi ' by M Dhurandher (1924) ... this is the picture ... while the painting was still under treatment to restore it to its original beauty ... the restored part (right) ... unrestored (left)

... a fabulous restoration done at Dharohar ...of an oil painting ...'Darbar of Maler Kotla' ( a 9' x 20' ... single canvas ) by Bourne and Shepherd - 1906 ... owned by a Five Star Hotel in Delhi ...

Meet Madhavi and Venkat Singh.She is the Managing Director and he ... the Director of Dharohar Art Conservation (P) Ltd. , and between them they are a team ... hard at work in the field of art conservation in India today.Their years of experience and skills ensures they can undertake projects ranging from oil painting, lithographs ... to old Haveli's ... involving stonework (read about it below).

With the present art scenario in India so hot and happening... where interest in buying art is seen as an Investment opportunity (just like in the West) ... having an organisation such as Dharohar is a boon.They are researching techniques to authenticate art through ... Art Conservation Assessment Studies ... in other words ... studying the ways in which that particular art piece was restored or treated ... to asses the authenticity of the art work ... this is definitely a big step in India where so far art work authentication relies heavily on inputs by art historians.After 16 yrs. of research they are today in a position to provide the scientific study for water colors.

Madhavi and Venkat are based out of Lucknow.Not just the hotspot for Connoisseurs of Art in India at one time ... but still the place that is the hub for art conservation efforts... with both governmental and NGO setups existing here.

Let me share with you some more pieces of work done by Dharohar, not to miss out the heritage oil paintings (restored at Dharohar), hanging in the background on the wall of their lab(top)... and the details of when that painting was under restoration (lower) ...

Another piece I really liked was this severally damaged oil painting ... restored to its original glory.

... and these very typical English fox hunt scene ... a paper etching ... which had water marks on it ... restored beautifully.

... this here is a Tempera painting by Jamini Roy, which was completely painted over with oil paints in an earlier attempt at restoration ... ( for those of you wondering who is Jamini Roy ... well ... he is considered one of the old India Masters ... and definitely one of the most significant and influential painters of 20th century India) ... Guess, the before and after pictures speak for themselves ... about the this restoration effort ...

...a beautiful Tankha painting ... before and after the restoration work ...

... a black and white photograph .... before and after ... (being a big b/w vintage photography buff ... I have so fallen in love with what Madhavi and Venkat did here) ...

Talking about their varied body of restoration work ... let me tell you about the Haveli 's restored by them ... the above picture is part of 16 such Haveli's (what's a Haveli ... in India and Pakistan Haveli refers to a private mansion from a bygone era ... definitely speaking of decadence and splendor) that were restored for a Mumbai based Industrialist. These Haveli's have existed for about 100-200 yrs. and over time the tropical climate ... salt and moisture from the sea winds caused erosion on the stone work ... along with growth of moss , algae and lichens ...

.... this is the before picture of the stone work .... the restoration efforts for this project needed them to clean the surfaces ... extract the salt that had gotten deposited ... consolidating (filling up ) the cracks ... and finally biocide treatment and a preservative coating to the surface , to check the weathering effects ...

... oh! dear ... look at the finished result ... Madhavi, I have to say this ... a sucker for all things heritage and an emotional junkie that I am ... I would be in tears if I had ever been there ... looking at your achievement ... :) ...

Going beyond just paintings ... etchings and architectural projects ... Dharohar also handles ceramics ... above is one such vintage ceramic plate ...

... another example of ceramic restoration ... a traditional Chinese horse ...

Madhavi and Venkat have also been instrumental in conservation of art work from the Varanasi Museum ... Jnana-Pravaha ... this here is one of the cloth paintings from that collection ...

There is so much more about ... Dharohar ... and what they do that I will need to do another post ... and you can count on that ... stay tuned ... for when I share with you their art authentication techniques ...

In the mean while you can read more about them on their web site ... http://dharohar.50webs.com/ and in case you have any questions ... just leave me a comment and Madhavi can help you out ... or you can directly mail them at ... www.dharohar@sify.com , www.dharohar@gmail.com ... I sure look forward to hearing all about your experience in discovering what you never knew about the world of restoring , our priceless treasures ... hope you enjoyed reading about it ... as I did , getting to know Madhavi and the amazing work she does ... :)