When this painting came to me my first reaction was that it could not be done. But then I thought, I know we can get the paint bonded back on the canvas, so if we can get all the loose pieces to fit where they belong, all we have to do is replace what is missing. Chris Nau sat down with tweezers and spent a few hours moving hundreds of little paint fragments back where they belonged. Hot wax was dripped over the entire surface of the painting to hold the fragments in place until we could transfer the painting to our vacuum table, where the paint film was securely re-bonded to the canvas. The completion of this job was a true team effort, lead by Jackie Trombley and assisted by Grace Lee and Jonny White. Chris Nau did the inpainting. The artist is E. A. Page.
Courtesy Swampscott Public Library