If Art Self-Destructs, Help Is at Hand : Many modern masters used exotic materials in creating works that are now decomposing, and proving difficult to preserve.

If you were savvy enough to pick up an original artwork by Robert Rauschenberg, Roy Lichtenstein, Ed Ruscha, Keith Haring or another prominent contemporary artist before they became superstars, you probably got yourself a piece that has skyrocketed in value.

But take heed. Unseen forces could be eating away at your artistic nest egg.

Cardboard, plywood, paper acids, Masonite, glass, adhesive tape and glues commonly used in framing or storing artworks could be damaging your treasure. To complicate matters, some artists, especially those who experimented with exotic materials in the 1960s and ‘70s, made art that is now decomposing and difficult to preserve.

If contemporary works are allowed to crumble, a large part of modern cultural history could be lost. In the short term, the deterioration affects the value of the art.

“People expect Old Masters’ paintings to show some signs of age,” said Paula Volent of the Hollywood art conservation firm of Aitchison, Watters & Volent. “But the aesthetics in the contemporary market call for everything to be pristine. The market value is very much predicated on condition.”

The price of getting a deteriorating piece back to pristine or near-pristine condition is not cheap. With local conservators charging as much as $125 an hour, even a minimal treatment can be costly, and a major repair can easily be more than the original price of a piece.

The trick, therefore, is to take preventive measures. To that end, local conservators had some advice for those who now own or are planning to buy contemporary art.

“The big problems started around the 18th Century when they started to put art on paper into frames,” said Mark Watters, a partner in the firm that specializes in works on paper. The majority of problems the firm sees, he said, are due to bad framing and mishandling.

“In olden times, paper was used mostly for drawings to make a study for a painting,” Watters said. “The drawings back then were not for display, they were thought of as something secondary. Then artworks on paper began to be thought of as an end in themselves. That’s when they went into frames and the problems began.”

With frames came the use of backing to support the artwork, a primary source of art damage.

“We see a lot of problems caused by cardboard,” said Robert Aitchison, another partner in the firm. To demonstrate, he pulled away the cardboard backing from a large Toulouse-Lautrec painting. Underneath, the back of the painting had taken on a brown tinge.

“Ordinary cardboard, which is a favorite backing used by amateur framers and some so-called professionals, has acids that can burn marks into the paper,” he said. “If it is not caught in time, it can burn through to the front of a painting or drawing.”

In one corner of the firm’s immaculate studio was a 1962 Jim Dine watercolor that was not caught in time. The entire front of the piece had taken on a brown tinge and a toothbrush, which had been glued on by Dine as part of the artwork, had fallen off.

“This piece was on a terrible mount, a thick piece of cardboard,” Volent said as she scraped away the backing.

When she gets it off--a job that will take several hours--she will carefully float the piece in a vat of water that she said should remove most of the discoloration. Finally, she will remove the adhesive that held the toothbrush in place and reglue it.

Only acid-free backings--including 100% rag board and corrugated cardboards specially made for this purpose--are safe, the conservators said.

Some wood products, such as plywood, that are made with formaldehyde should not be used in frames. Fumes from the chemical can damage paint and paper. Unprocessed woods can also be dangerous because many include a naturally occurring chemical that can cause yellowing and discoloration of artworks on paper. If a wooden frame is used, it should be sealed with a special resin to isolate the artwork. Other materials to be avoided in framing are rubber cement and any tape not specifically approved for use on art. Volent showed how tape stains marred the back of an otherwise pristine Lichtenstein lithograph.

“These marks were caused by linen tapes, which are a lot less destructive than those made by pressure tapes like Scotch tape or masking tape, but it’s important to get them off,” she said. “In the future, they will work their way through so that they show in the front.”

Glass in frames can also be a problem, especially if it comes into contact with the art. “Certain materials can transfer right on to the glass,” Aitchison said. Improperly used glass can lead to other problems, including a buildup in humidity that can cause drip marks or mold. In most cases, he said, it’s best to forgo glass altogether as a covering in favor of an ultraviolet-absorbing plexiglass.

Whether the covering is glass or plexiglass, it should be isolated from the art by the use of a window mat or plexiglass spacers.

Even if the covering is top-notch and properly placed, light shining on the art can be a problem.

“One of the rules is to watch out for sunlight,” said Eric Hansen, an associate scientist with the Getty Conservation Institute in Marina del Rey. “An artwork can fade, just like a couch in sunlight, especially if a natural dye or pigment was in the paint used by the artist.”

The damage done by sunlight is usually cumulative and irreversible, Hansen said. He suggested that collectors rotate artworks periodically to prevent them from getting a constant dose of light from the same angle. He also warned that art that includes fragile materials, such as silk, should be kept away from heat sources. Collectors living near the ocean should be especially careful to use mats that won’t warp or crack with changes in humidity.

Many of the rules for framing should also be followed when storing art--primarily, contact should be avoided with papers that contain acid, wood and glass. Also, artworks on paper should generally be stored flat.

Another of Volent’s recent projects was a series of spectacularly colored silk-screens done in 1983 by Keith Haring. They were in good shape, except that they were curling up at the edges.

“They had probably been rolled up and stored for a while,” she said as she sprayed a fine mist of water on the silk-screen (she had previously tested it to make sure that the colors would not be affected by water). The artwork immediately began to relax and go flat. Volent placed it under weights to let it dry.

“It’s a small thing, but even the ends curling up slightly can affect the asking price if not taken care of,” Volent said.

Sometimes the problem is the artwork itself, which makes conservation more difficult. Aitchison and Volent worked on a well-known, untitled 1955 Rauschenberg piece in the Museum of Contemporary Art collection that made use of comic book pages. The paper, needless to say, was colorful but not of the best quality. To keep the paper from crumbling, they asked Hansen to determine what resins could be used to strengthen it.

They applied resins with tiny brushes periodically for almost a year before the paper on the three-dimensional collage, which is popularly known as “Man in the White Shoes,” was declared stable. “It was also pretty scary because of the piece’s place in art history,” Volent said of the work, which is considered one of Rauschenberg’s most important early pieces. “It was an honor to work on it, but it was also petrifying.”

Volent has also worked on pieces by artists who made use of such exotic materials as caviar, lipstick, Pepto Bismol and even blood. “These materials are interesting, but they can make conservation a challenge, to say the least,” she said.

The materials used are especially important in the conservation of sculptures, according to Rosa Lowinger, owner of the Sculpture Conservation Studio in Santa Monica. “One of the main things we deal with is losses or, in other words, things that fall off,” Lowinger said. “There are a lot of reasons for this, but one of the main ones is that an artist uses two materials, such as two kinds of plastic, in a way that causes a reaction. The joint can crack or come loose.”

She suggested that collectors inspect the joints of sculptures to check for cracks before they buy.

The best way to preserve a sculpture is to house it under ideal temperature and humidity. This is seldom practical, especially for big sculptures that are placed outside.

“Most outside sculptures need maintenance, which shouldn’t come as a surprise,” Lowinger said. “You wouldn’t keep your Mercedes outdoors without washing it and waxing it on occasion.”

Lowinger suggested that owners of sculptures kept outside should ask a conservator to design a maintenance program that includes annual inspections.

With even a rudimentary knowledge of materials and an awareness of how the environment can affect artworks, a collector or dealer can ensure that the art will have a long life and retain its value. But in the end, of course, all the conservation measures in the world cannot stop the clock.

“We can’t think of an artwork as being fixed in time,” Watters said. “It’s aging, just like we do. We can intercede and try to put it in the best setting possible, but there are limits.

“And that’s the way it should be.”