AIC's 45th Annual Meeting

East Asian scrolls are well known for their rolling and unrolling system. Above all, flatness, softness, thinness, and smoothness are the four characteristics of a good Chinese painting scroll. Drying process for Chinese paintings is one of the important treating steps among all. Speaking of drying board, one would think about a Japanese Karibari which is an orange board with multi layers of paper on top of undercore of wooden lactic and coated with persimmon juice. This orange board, however, is distracting to some degree compared to otherwise a white board, when a conservator retouching on compensation for losses on a thin Chinese xuan paper, due to the transparency of thin xuan paper. This topic first introduces traditional Chinese methods and techniques of making drying boards and drying wall. The undercores of wooden lattices, muti layers of paper and application methods are introduced. Then, the innovation of drying boards is secondly introduced. Gator boards are the replacement of wooden lattices due to its lightweight. This new innovation is nowadays widely used in East Asian paintings conservation studios within the US. Finally, techniques of making drying wall are introduced because it is essential for an oversized Chinese painting, which usually poses a big challenge for conservators. A comparison for pros and cons among the innovational and traditional drying board/wall is discussed. The water proof coatings on the board surface are compared in the end. Chinese drying boards and walls are coated with animal glue solution. Japanese drying boards are coated with persimmon juice. The innovational coating that is used in most East Asian painting conservation studio in US is Rhoplex™ emulsion. Different kinds of Rhoplex™ are experimented to test for its durability, water proofness, and stickiness. The Asian conservation studio in Cleveland Museum of Art has Japanese Karibari with persimmon juice coating, innovational drying boards with gator boards as undercore and Rhoplex™ coating and traditional drying wall with animal glue coating. Those have their advantages and disadvantages.