Image Spectroscopy for conservation and diagnostics of contemporary painting materials

The aim of this work is to validate measurements, analysis methods and instruments for the recognition of faint chromatic alterations. Image Spectroscopy has been already demonstrated to be a good choice for these purposes. A new portable device for Image Spectroscopy is described and evaluated with some applications on some contemporary pigments. Reflectance spectra have been quantitatively analysed by Principal Component Analysis (PCA). Colorimetry, on the other hand, has been used to synthesize the data collected by contact spectrophotometry. The two techniques are compared here with a view to an early detection of alterations. A final application, which discriminates different formulations of pigment, is also proposed.