Restoration
Conservation and Preservation of Artworks
In Spain, the Museo Reina Sofía’s Department of Conservation-Restoration is a reference point of contemporary art conservation. The department is made up of a specialist multidisciplinary team and a laboratory equipped with advanced technology enabling the in-depth study and analysis of artworks and their materials to be carried out with a view to establishing conservation procedures and pinpointing the most suitable interventions.
From this starting point, restoration treatments and preventative conservation work are carried out on the artworks housed in all of the Museo’s sites — i.e. both permanent and temporary works — as well as on holdings from the Museo Reina Sofía’s Library and Documentation Centre.
To consolidate the Museo as a space of research and to exchange ideas and practices, the Department of Conservation-Restoration organises conferences, seminars and technical encounters with a range of professionals, institutions and entities which specialise in the field of contemporary art conservation and restoration. These activities thus seek to open new channels of study and reflection on the practice and profession of the conservator-restorer. Worthy of mention within this context are the Annual Contemporary Art Conservation Conferences, which, along with their corresponding publications, can be consulted here, and the Course on Handling, Packing, Transporting and Installing Cultural Heritage Artefacts, offering migrant people from Madrid’s Lavapiés neighbourhood the chance to familiarise themselves with the handling of artworks and the installation of exhibitions, and at the same time facilitating labour integration.
![Salvador Dalí. Objet surréaliste [Objeto surrealista], 1936. Guante de chocolate](https://recursos.museoreinasofia.es/styles/small_landscape/public/Actividades/ciencia_g.jpg.webp)
