It’s December, so it’s about time for a thorough cleaning…
A thorough year-end cleaning is a regular tradition for households and businesses alike, marking the end of the year.
The same is true of cultural facilities such as art museums. The Ohara Museum of Art, located in the Bikan Historical Area, also held its annual year-end event: a major cleaning.
This article reports on the Ohara Museum of Art Year-End Cleaning, which was held on December 13, 2021, and partially opened to the public.
Photography is normally prohibited inside the Ohara Museum of Art. Permission to take photographs was granted for this report.
The information presented was current when this article was published in December 2021. Please note that it may differ from current information.
About the Ohara Museum of Art
Established in 1930, the Ohara Museum of Art was Japan’s first private museum focused on Western art.
It comprises the Main Building, the Annex, and the Crafts and Oriental Art Gallery, and houses approximately 3,000 works.
As of December 2021, the Annex, which displayed mainly modern and contemporary Japanese art, was closed to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Some works were moved to the Main Building and put on display.
The year-end cleaning took place in the Main Building, with only the cleaning of selected paintings open to the public.
The painting-cleaning process
Before work began, Tsukamoto Takayuki, a curator responsible for the preservation and management of the collection, gave instructions to the staff who would be carrying out the cleaning.
To avoid damaging the paintings, staff checked that they were wearing gloves, had no rings or wristwatches on, had nothing in their breast pockets, and were not wearing anything around their necks before cleaning began.
The paintings were cleaned in the following order.
- Lower the paintings to the floor
- Brush dust off the frames
- Wipe down the front acrylic panels
- Brush dust off the backs
- Wipe down the panels on the backs
- Return the paintings to their original positions
Of these steps, only curators carry out steps 1 and 6.
There are a few exceptions, such as transport companies whose staff are trained to handle artworks, but the industry rule is that only curators may touch works in a museum’s collection.
For this reason, even when museum staff do the cleaning, they must work “under the direction of a curator.”
First, the following works were cleaned in the exhibition room on the first floor of the Main Building.
- Paul Signac, “The Canal at Auvers”
- Claude Monet, “Water Lilies”
- Pierre Bonnard, “The Cat on the Railing”
- Paul Gauguin, “The Delightful Land”
Lowering the paintings to the floor
First, the works are lowered to the floor.
The curators handled them with great care.
Brushing dust off the frames
Dust is gently brushed away using a soft brush.
This task was carried out by Ohara Museum of Art staff, but the curator occasionally stepped in to give a warning, creating a slightly tense atmosphere.
Wiping down the front acrylic panels
Next, the front acrylic panels are wiped down with a soft cloth soaked in an ethanol solution diluted to about 10% for cleaning.
Cleaning the backs
After the front has been cleaned, the back is cleaned as well.
The process is the same as for the front, but it feels novel to see the back of a frame, which we don’t normally get to see.
Returning the paintings to their original positions
Once the cleaning is finished, the curators return the works to their original positions.
The entire process took about 10 to 15 minutes.
Cleaning El Greco’s “The Annunciation”
The cleaning of El Greco’s “The Annunciation” on the second floor of the Main Building was also open to the public.
The cleaning process was the same for this work as well.
Looking back on 2021 at the Ohara Museum of Art (with Deputy Director Morikawa)
Finally, Deputy Director Morikawa Masanori gave an interview and spoke about wrapping up the year and looking ahead to the next year.
Last year (2020) was a thorny path, and this year, too, brought many ups and downs and hardships.
We hope that next year the COVID-19 pandemic will move toward an end, even if only slightly, and that travel restrictions will be eased so we can welcome visitors from outside the prefecture again.
We want people to see and experience authentic works of art.
We believe this is our mission, and hope that people will enjoy a spiritually enriching time through art.
From the Writer
Since 2020, restrictions on going out due to the COVID-19 pandemic have dealt a major financial blow to the Ohara Museum of Art.
During the Q&A, someone asked, “With visitor numbers down, has less dust been accumulating?”
“It’s true that numbers fell considerably last year (2020), but this year (2021), although there were fewer visitors, we were still able to welcome people, so I think the dust has increased accordingly.
We are currently limiting the number of staff coming to work, so it’s difficult to clean every work of art during the annual deep clean alone, but we carry out routine cleaning all the time.”
I was struck by this response.
Even when no one is there, the museum is alive.
I hope that in 2022 the Ohara Museum of Art will welcome more visitors and that Kurashiki’s Bikan Historical Area will once again be bustling.
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