Conservation Division
National Gallery of Art
2000B South Club Drive
Landover, MD 20785
[email protected]

Analytical Imaging

Analytical imaging is a part of the scientific research department in conservation. Using multi-spectral cameras and sophisticated software to process output from the imaging devices used, staff can examine works of art to determine compositional changes and capture spectral data that indicates the materials used in making a work of art. Explore the systems used in the projects that are presented on this page.

Will Bosch’s Miser Achieve Salvation?

Infrared examination of Hieronymus Bosch’s Death and the Miser discloses extensive underdrawing and significant differences between the underdrawn composition and the final painted image.

Art-Science

Renaissance Illuminations

Explore how imaging is used to examine a choir book commissioned by the Camaldolese monks of Santa Maria degli Angeli in Florence at the end of the 14th century.

Pablo Picasso, "The Tragedy"

Picasso often left visual clues on the surfaces of his paintings to suggest a hidden image underneath, as in The Tragedy (1903). Artists frequently make changes to a painting or reuse a canvas or panel with an image already painted on it. Explore this painting further to see how it reveals its secrets.