Coming up ahead of us. From china rats made of polyester. To lashings of synthetic resin. The big name contemporary artists are radical purveyors of pushing back the boundaries of convention. Very early on i always use or turn also were not our income awards news motor or or dirt. Actual. How do you deal with unstable materials. Im not talking to christian about how to conserve my work. Im talking about how i making out. Today the entire art world faces a huge challenge in how to preserve contemporary masterpieces many of the an orthodox. Materials used are not designed to last forever. German conservator christian shine a man is the go to man in this field. His new york studio deals with many of the most important works of our time. Leading galleries multimillionaire collectors and many of the worlds top Living Artists all seek his help. Christian chinaman opened his new york studio in 2002 but his career started in the german city of hamburg his 1st restoration studio was on the fleet until an island surrounded by canals in a beautiful old building. On november 9th 1909 the same day the berlin wall came down a huge new exhibition space open in the home of the dutch to holland became a leading center for contemporary art. Thats just suddenly we have these 2 halls in hamburg that were dedicated to large scale exhibitions of contemporary art and art restorers found themselves facing new demands like how can i conserve a loaf of bread thats part of an exhibition what do i do when i need candy that always needs to look original even 300 years from now and what we did not always do conflict on all in the. Christiane was the right man at the right time with his natural curiosity and nothink stated on old techniques and ways of thinking. There was one tragic mishap involving a wash basin by a hole but. A child evidently thought it was a real sink and wanted to swing on the edge of it so it ended up broken and christiane was called in he went to go best studio in new york and i think that was his 1st foot in the door to the new york art worlds. Majok a quince to vote tory but my work at the top holland in hamburg brought me into contact with a range of artists it was very inspiring and these artists would ask me questions that no one in hamburg had ever asked before. Like how do i conserve bananas. I found it really interesting. So through dr holland i got to know a lot of artists and the wider art scene i mean i remember going along a street in hamburg one day and getting a call from david. And he said we need someone like you in new york. Do you fancy coming to america discerning just now i mean not to the. 71 national obviously its wonderful to visit all the art studios here in new york and to be involved in the production of these works the research for them and ultimately conserving them to. The. Christian chinaman loves getting on his bike and writing to his studio in chelsea but these days hes often traveling the globe advising artists during the Creative Process or seeking to rescue a piece thats been damaged. Generally artworks come to our studio just before theyre about to change hands. So we have to be very discreet because obviously no collector or auction house wants to see their works in a restoration studio in a moment so the studios in. These days are is often produced in a very short space of time but conserving it is painstaking work that requires a lot of devotion schneiderman works with a team of highly specialized conservators. Its a really amazing place to be work comes here to the studio was not just a monetary value but its also got an emotional value as far as monetary value we try to remain at arms length as much as possible because for conservator to do their work properly it doesnt matter if the work is from a junkyard or if its worth 10000000. 00 you still have to execute the same sort of treatment. Today a work but on vogue american artist way gotten has arrived at the studio. He creates his large scale works using printing. Many are displayed in art museums. Came from germany and the crate was never opened apparently and then this happened to fall on the head of. The 5 fans on the side. Of the painting it looks pretty severe to me someone inside the crate to fix it. Then i. Feel all these flashes are of it yeah i see. Its mostly in the right. So were on the top. There was an unstable climate or so so you make some steps and times but. Theres also this misconception too that things come here only if theyre broken and thats not the case so often things come here just for a Commission Report are things come here to be cleaned or you know just to be freshened up which isnt necessarily. A definite you know so its a one stop shop where. We do it up it is its like no ive done this drawing that illustrates the path taken by an artwork from the artists studio to the museum so. It includes the individual stops which usually involve a freelance conservator at some stage so ardor of. The work is born in the artists studio. Many contemporary works comprise experiments with untested materials. The artwork then leaves the studio. For the 1st time its now in the hands of people outside the studio presenting a high risk. At this stage changes can still be made. The photo for a catalogue then documents its original condition. Whichever gallery puts the work on the market decides its future fate. It might find a permanent home in the house of a collector but often artwork. Bought as an investment and spend their lives in storage. Storage with display for art experts. If the work gets purchased by a museum the museums and restores take care of it. If an accident at any stage causes irreparable damage the work and up an Insurance Company storehouse ending its life. The. Stations that an artwork passes through from artists studio to museum are a source of danger but also of joy for the artwork some artists say their works get better treatment than they do. 0 for the museum of modern art in new york be ephemeral nature of many contemporary art works is a major challenge. Its thrown up new questions for the museums chief curator for painting and sculpture and. Whole new phenomenon over these last couple of decades which christian represents absolutely of close collaboration in the creation of the artwork many artists really are consulting with conservators before or during their making work. And in the olden days that would not have been true. Christian chinaman is a frequent visitor to los angeles an important center for art. Today hell be working for paul mccarthy. His task to conserve desert dust on a sculpture by the american coast pop artist Mccarthy Rose to fame through his provocative performance art. Are the other not so i 1st met mccarthy in 1903 during the posthuman exhibition in hamburg in the dive to holland im amazed at the creations that he and his sizeable team come up with the most is the team. This is Paul Mccartney is a version of a pirate ship made and here hes created a traumatized version of disneys 7 dwarfs. They have a somewhat demented look as they stare back at their observers. This culture references westerns again he distorts the myths of american movie making. Mccarthys team numbers up to 40 people and includes sculptors engineers and carpenters who turn his visions into reality here a group of experts are working on a silicon replica of mccarthys own body. When you use the Technology Part of that Motion Picture industry and also parks all those kind of stuff it really functions work on the people and ball. Sympathy and interest in art. What that. Is some degree its it has to do with obstructing look more miles. A day or slipping out of the form an expression about whatever the absurdity of existence. One of the pieces are inches from my this is a film that i have from a life cast and cast them in silicone and put skeletons in them so they can move and we use them in the films a sort of film doubles for certain actions and especially action was involved i am contained in that process we filmed in the desert and dust gets all over d. All over our fake blood the question then began to be as objects to sell and columns could last platinum silicone a theoretical a should have a really indefinite life but that would get in the dirt in the dust and became like do i try and preserve this. Physical yet so the money just as you can conserve man surfaces on paintings were trying here to conserve matt surfaces on sculptures and there are ways of doing that. And here i know the whole thing reminds me of eve klein paintings which often have very powdery surfaces. Coby units here here were trying out a medical nebulizer house or in this case were putting in sturgeon glue dissolved in water on india that will be vaporized in the air and then very slowly settle on the grains of dust and link them with each other so that they dont immediately fall off and you might even be able to touch them and this is the 1st conservator i ever really approached and he wants a conservator that was interest a lot of the issues that were being brought up by contemporary artist dita wrote them shows the boy is in flux or sort. Of the things that and materials that were being used. In a way come out of that tradition. Turn. To some other. Lets not lose. Thats all of. Us. All in. This sand. Beautifully. Pretty. Soon. Our. Next christian chinaman had to brooklyn to visit us. And coming artist ryan sullivan. For the 1st time hes going to be on hand as sullivan creates a new art work allowing him to study how the materials behave during the process. Of willing you should just go do. A Little Charity and ill put it into a purse that will take it from there. Brian sullivan turned to him and to get a better understanding of the chemical reactions involved in his paintings. Hes left a number of works to dry overnight. Using paint brushes he applied resin mixed with color pigments into silicon molds. Every morning we take them out of the molds and slip them over and so vats the 1st time that we see the face of the painting. I used to hold the big is the rez is toxic. Or like a minutes silence and when i start working yes the machine start the fans the machines come on and i dont think its. Intentional. Thing that i have added but may be subconsciously these things become part of. The head space. As my working seems very. Useful of a calm and goal amongst painters in the late sixties to the relevance of painting a power. Of painting despite the fact theres been a lot of criticism about whether painting is still a valid medium to use. Thats why i said i could trip. So you directed that but then it did something but oh so little yeah that drips a car and it all but this would go on and really dance over the city and they said so so it was because the electricity that is there in the beginning of catalogs say they do that meeting up and they move around a little bit but its almost like my theory being that you know that there are these puppets about this coming up. When work such as those by sullivan are transported special attention has to be paid to the materials they contain. The crows your company is a specialist in this area and like shot him in studio its based in the new york art district of chelsea. Most accidents occur during transport because of the size of the works there are enormous value and the delicate materials involved transporting them as a major operation. I am one of the people that goes out on the trucks 1st here and takes artworks installs the tracks the condition reports that we meet with clients and problems all the difficulty was out there and come up with trying to move something really valuable and difficult to handle. Many contemporary art works for all shergold they wont fit to majority of their roles for International Travel but they sometimes try to fix him. From the launch of trucks that we use so we often look to other industries to learn lessons where the routes of extreme trade should look to hell not so move some of their large truck i change around whether its up to lights or whether its for rockets. I have studied sculpture but i do photography and performance based on. My vocation is to be an artist but you know for now im just a creative crozier for of people or artists because then they already have the experience with handling work. Once these objects get parent your way into their boxes i always kind of wonder when we want to see them go to. A gallery shows the artwork in perfect condition and ideal surroundings. In order for that to work the artist and the gallery have to trust each other. And our gallery which operates on 3 continents represents british artist chris ofili. He was the 1st black artist to win the prestigious turner prize. Feeley became famous for using elephant dung in his paintings shadowman has been advising him for years on how to work with this organic material. Ofili exhibition paradise lost takes visitors on a journey through lost innocence alienation and desire. A little bit of a new direction in the work in terms of black and white power as. They seem very abstract and. You cant really enter the cage so were looking from the outside and we have these beautiful murals that are behind us but they somehow mirror some of the imagery that we see within the sounds there for individual works and ultimately it will probably make their way to my walls through. The actual explosion of the art market has made conservators that particular christian increasingly needed as a conservator hes in demand now all over the world and so he is now working with a number of collectors who really want him to have a look at anything they buy before they actually make a final commitment and he maintains advises them on storage and transport and also for philosophical intellectual aspects related to artist intentions. Because. This is a watercolor by chris ofili that he gave to me. And its very nicely framed from the back with a dedication. Of my own thanks chris so all you continue to support. What id like. To impart fish i basically travelled all over the world visiting various collectors to stabilize their pictures because everywhere there was elephant dung that was slowly coming away from the layer of paint and causing breaches. Will hit it was a couple easier the pictures are propped up against the wall standing on elephant dung that has been soaked in resin. Its good to think is. This is sinking sand for chris its important that its not just any elephant dung but specifically from elephants in london zoo. And once when he was here you go down the names of the elephants that he collaborates with as it were. Long. Money. And of course that creates a personal link with this dung. Chris doesnt see it as excrement at all. But as an important means of orientation for nomads in the desert prefigures of it until its material for no martin and agrees to this is also the mind bit for those its also an important Building Material for nomads and its used for making a fire too much. In a way hes almost like a Fashion Country doctor who makes house calls he likes to touch the object hes not afraid of the object ive noticed that when he is shown something that for which you know we we need his opinion help touch it hes not going to focus finger in it but he wants almost like someone a good medical examiner what will touch and i really feel the patient. In her work strange fruit named after the song by Billie Holiday installation artist zoe leonard explores the fleeting nature of life following the tradition of vanita still life paintings in the early ninetys she scooped out the flesh of 300. 00 pieces of fruit and then sew them back together with needle and thread. Cindy all you know by these are the original banana skins that she stitched back together. Is it man this is an orange. The work was inspired by her friend david voight norwich who had died of aids. And then she heard they were able to conserve food so she got in contact. And we did all kinds of tests and after 2 years of correspondence she decided to just leave it instead. Leonard informed christian of her decision in a letter. As for the fruit i did sleep on it and i reached a decision im very pleased about it i decided that the fruit should be left to disintegrate slowly. I thought of many other things about saving the skin after the fruit is gone decorating death. That there is something pathetic and something beautiful in our need to preserve. May. Private art collectors also faced the question of what to do about perishable materials. Jill krauss and her husband are collectors of contemporary art she doesnt seek expert advice when buying her work preferring to follow her own intuition instead. She says her artworks are like members of the family. Business nicole eyes in men when i love about this is it spring in the artists studio into our apartment issues that are difficult to deal with as a collector i mean these steps why the tube of paint. Goes through the hole in the floor and lots of organic materials and things that over time will definitely have its challenges we have a lot of things in our collection that are definitely major materials that are not. Conservation happy christian and i have really bonded over the years over things that are difficult were going to walk into the living room and im referring to this from is my garbage room all the artwork is made with detritus so things that have been sort of thrown away and bring used by the artist there are problem children and and i was sort of referred to the earths whose children because they are temperamental like little kids are now on to another possible step in the process. And basel switzerland. Run by the hair talking democrat Architecture Firm it has a unique concept its a Storage Place for art but here the works are not stowed away in boxes theyre put on display in rooms offering the ideal climate conditions. This allows experts to study the originals and observe any changes. So not just the shell naga is an open Storage Space for art unlike other Storage Options the art here is not packed away but unpacks one problem that a lot of museums face is having to lock away many of their works. The advantage here is that you can constantly work with the collection even if its not being made accessible to the public to. Sit and want to get off so this is im on a graphic storeroom for Matthew Barney barney works with a lot of new materials so enabling the works here to be studied intensively and checked regularly represents huge progress. And this 6 often Matthew Barney is often inspired by materials that are intelligent or that have certain abilities that makes it really interesting for the conservator so. Hes a real master of the linguistics of materials. The darling of the new york art scene plays the leading ro