Africa. From giant 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 was yours are going to turtles that were noncontroversial a large news motor or dirt dust action. How do you deal with unstable materials. Im not talking to question about how to conserve my work. Im talking about how im making it. Today the entire art world faces a huge challenge in how to preserve contemporary masterpieces many of the un orthodox materials used. Are not designed to last forever. German conservator christian shite 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 flight 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 hamburg the dutch to holland became a leading center for contemporary art. Thats it 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 didnt let on all in the io. Because christiane was the right man at the right time with his natural curiosity and enough fixated on old techniques and ways of thinking. There was one tragic mishap involving a washbasin 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 bare 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 dosh to 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 harlan i got to know a lot of artists and the wider art scene i mean i remember going along the 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 youve got to. Start really going after an 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. Do. But. 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. You know they can start 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 or monosodium studios in. These days art 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 is not just a monetary value but its also got an emotional value as far as monetary value we try to remain on the sly as much as possible because for a 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 inkjet printing. Many are displayed in art museums. Came from germany and the crate was never opened apparently and then this happens to fall on the head of. The 5 fans. Of the painting it looks pretty severe to me someone inside the crate i can fix it. Then i. Feel these precious part of it yeah its the. Its mostly in the right. Of the word on the top. Yeah it was an unstable climate or so so you make some steps sounds good but. Theres also this misconception too that things come here only if theyre broken and thats not the case often things come here just for a Commission Report are things come here to be cleaned or you know just to be freshen up which isnt necessarily. Again you know so its a one stop shop where. We do it up it is its arsenal 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. Combined 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. On as the stations that an artwork passes through from Artist 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. For the museum of modern art in new york the 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 arts. 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. Not the other nonce 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 ones im most with team mom. This is Paul Mccartneys version of a pirate ship. And here hes created a traumatized version of disneys 7 dwarves. 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. Will you use the Technology Part of that Motion Picture industry and also theme parks all those kind of stuff it really functions work on the people and ball. I have sympathy and interest in the art. What. Is some degree its it has to do with obstructing the normality or for bringing a form an expression about the absurdity of existence. One of the pieces are inches from my film that i may live cast and cast with still a poem and then put skeletons when im so. Move well use them in the films and sort of film doubles for certain actions and especially action was involved. In that process we filmed in the desert and dust gets all over. All over fake blood the question then began to be those objects the solar columns could last platinum solar. Feel rather clay should have a really indefinite life but they would get in the dirt in the dos. Became like do i try and preserve this. Physical yet so if the money just as you can conserve mat surfaces on paintings were trying here to conserve that surfaces on sculptures and there are ways of doing that. And here i know the whole thing reminds me of yves klein paintings which often have very powdery surfaces. Here and were trying out a medical nebulizer. In this case were putting in sturgeon glue dissolved in water. 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. He was the 1st conservator i ever really approached he was a conservator there was interest a lot of the issues that were being brought up by temporary art of the road to joes a boy is in flux a storm the things are the kind of materials that were being used. In a way come out of production to. Be. Done. He. Spoke. To robert. Lets not lose. But thats all of that. Is all true. And this and. The. Trump beautifully. Is a pretty little. Scene. Our. Next christian chinaman heads to brooklyn to visit up and coming artist ryan sullivan. For the 1st time hes going to be on hand as sullivan creates a new artwork allowing him to study how the materials behave during the process. Of every day when you think just. Got the most ready and ill put him to anchor. Lets take a few. Ryan sullivan turned to shot 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 moments. Every morning we take them out of the molds and flip them over and so bats the 1st time that we see the face of the painting. I used to hold the big is the rez it is toxic. Or like a minute silent and when i start working yes the machine start the fans the machines come on and i dont think its. Intentional. Thing that i batted but may be subconsciously these things become part of. The headspace. As my working moms were. In school for calm and gold mongst painters the late sixtys to assert the relevance of painting and the power of painting despite the fact theres been a lot of criticism about whether a painting is still valid medium to use. This was a back trip. So you direct it but then it gets something out of the. Grips. Oh but theres a. Related and so over the silicone that they said so so i i must be a sceptic to see what is that in the beginning of count i say they do that eating it move around a little bit but its almost like my theory being that you know that that is puppets of its coming out. 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. By one of the people that goes out on the trucks and 1st hand takes artworks and stalls the tags the Commission Reports so we meet with clients and problems all the difficult things out there and come up with trying to move something really valuable and difficult to handle. Many contemporary art works today show gold but they wont fit to majority of their calls for International Travel but they sometimes dont fit in even the launch of trucks that we use so we often look to other industries to learn lessons whether its an extreme case you look to hell not so move some of their launcher i change around whether its stoplights or whether its for other rockets. I have studied sculpture but i do photography and performance based on. My vocation is to be an artist you know for now im just a creator crozier prefer people or artists because they may already have the experience with handling work. Once these objects give her way into their boxes i always kind of wonder when what he wants to see will be. 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. The gallery which operates on 3 continents represents british artist chris ofili. He was the 1st black artist to win the prestigious turner prize. Ofili became famous for using elephant dung in his paintings shadowman has been advising him for years on how to work with this organic material. Oh feelings exhibition paradise lost takes visitors on a journey through lost innocence alienation and desire. A little bit of a new direction in the work and in terms of black and white power. They seem very abstract patterns 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 fans 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 in particular christian increasingly needed as a conservator is in demand now all over the world and so it is now working with a number of collectors who really want them to have a look at anything they buy before they actually make the final commitment and he maintains. Advises them on storage and transport and also work philosophical intellectual aspects of related artists intentions. Because. This is a watercolor by chris ofili that he gave to me. And its very nicely frame from the back with a dedication. Of mine thanks to sell all you continue to support. What chris. And doctors have basically traveled 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. Push it was the companies here the pictures are propped up against the wall standing on elephant dung that has been soaked in resin. Its a twinked is innocent think this and 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. Young 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. For no martin and to this is also doing my bit for this its also an important Building Material for nomads and its used for making a fire too much. In a way its almost like a Fashion Country doctor who makes house calls he likes to touch the object is not afraid of the object ive noticed that when he is shown something that for which you know we we need his opinion hell touch it hes not going to focus finger on it but he wants almost like someone a good medical examiner will or will touch and and 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. And the by these of the original banana skins that she stitched back together. This is an orange. The work was inspired by her friend david voight norwich who had died of aids. And then she heard that 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. 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 thing about saving the skin after the fruit is gone decorating death. That there is something pathetic and something beautiful in our need to preserve. Private art collectors also faced the question of what to do about perishable materials. Krauss and her husband are collectors of contemporary art she doesnt seek expert advice when buying a work preferring to follow her own intuition instead. She says her artworks are like members of the family. This is nicole lives in men where i live about this is. The artists studio into our apartment this is got issues that are difficult to deal with as a collector i mean the stacks like the tube of paint goes through the hole in the floor lots of organic materials and things that over time will definitely. Its challenges we have a lot of things in our collection that are definitely major tiriel 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 trim all the artwork is made with detritus so things that have been sort of thrown away and green used by the artist there are problem children and and i referred to the earths whose children because they are temperamental like little kids start now on to another possible step in the process the shallow end basel switzerland. Run by the head talking to moran 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 show naga is an open Storage Space for arts 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. This is a mana 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. At least 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 i think hes a real master of the linguistics of materials stick. In. The the darling of the new york art scene plays the leading role in his famous film project the cream master cycle. Its a mixed media project involving a suite of 5 feature length films with related sculptures photographs and dr