The Niki Charitable Art Foundation is excited to welcome our newest team member, art conservator Joy Bloser!
Ms. Bloser joined the NCAF after five years at the prestigious Menil Collection in Houston, TX where she cared for modern and contemporary objects, sculptures, and time-based media. It was while working as the conservation lead on the exhibition Niki de Saint Phalle in the 1960s from September 2021-January 2022 that she became acquainted with the NCAF. Following the exhibition, she continued to research and publish on conservation strategies for preserving works by Niki de Saint Phalle and Jean Tinguely in the collection.
After an art education at Middlebury College, earning a BA in both Chinese Language & Literature and the History of Art & Architecture, she moved to Beijing, China to pursue a career in art. Ms. Bloser worked as the Assistant Curator and Exhibitions Manager at the UCCA Center for Contemporary Art and later in VIP relations for Art Basel in Hong Kong before she returned to the United States to pursue her graduate studies in Art Conservation. She attended the Institute of Fine Arts at NYU and earned an MA in the History of Art & Archaeology as well as an MS in Conservation of Historic & Artistic Works. Upon graduation, she joined the Conservation Department at the Museum of Modern Art in New York to complete her final fellowship training in objects conservation. It was at MoMA that she treated her first artwork by Niki de Saint Phalle.
The Q&A below introduces Joy Bloser and highlights her work as the NCAF’s first art conservator.
Do you have a favorite art piece by Niki de Saint Phalle?
I am currently quite in love with Niki’s Tableaux Éclatés, I had never seen these moving paintings from the early 1990s before joining the Foundation and adore their kinetic, collaged and constructive narrative.
Have you worked on any Niki pieces before joining the team?
The first work I treated by Niki was the Tir in the MoMA’s collection, Shooting Painting American Embassy (1961), I remember making delicate supports to keep the aged and brittle plastic bags holding the paint remnants from splitting or shattering. After joining the Menil Collection, I had the opportunity to treat several more of her works. My favorite treatment was perhaps the kinetic M.O.N.S.T.R.E.(1964) she made together with Jean. I had to source and modify a vintage rubber alligator toy to replace one that had crumbled away and stabilize all the newsprint she collaged onto his head. I also had to figure out the mechanics of the original motor to ensure it was operating at the correct speed. I have treated several Tirs, Tir elements, some plastic inflatables, and supervised the conservation of Niki’s painted polyester resin sculptures from 1971, Cat and Camel.
M.O.N.S.T.R.E. by Niki de Saint Phalle and Jean Tinguely, 1964 © Paul Hester, The Menil Collection
What excited you most about joining our organization?
As a museum conservator, I have worked on a vast array of artworks and artists, but only rarely did I have the opportunity to work on several artworks by the same artist in any collection. In working for the NCAF, I have the privilege of deep diving into a single artist’s work and focusing on preservation strategies specific to Niki’s materials and techniques. The Foundation holds an incredible collection and has already built a strong network of care with collectors, institutions, fabricators, and conservators around the globe and I am incredibly grateful to be working within such an unique context to preserve Niki’s legacy.
What would you like to accomplish in your first year at the NCAF?
This first year I think I will be doing a lot of listening, reading, and looking! There are so many deep histories, memories, and relationships that are integral to preserving Niki’s work, and the Foundation has such an innate understanding of her materials and approach. I hope to use this first year to ground myself in the “Niki-verse,” as archives director, Jana Mooneyhan, calls it and begin to prioritize condition issues, research topics, treatment challenges, conservation initiatives, and collections care needs.
Are there any techniques or approaches you’re especially excited to bring into this position?
My approach as a conservator is quite collaborative, I like to work with many different experts to find the best solution for an artwork and to share out those solutions so we can collectively improve how we care for Niki’s work around the world. As for new techniques, I’m excited to bring more imaging technology to the Foundation to better understand Niki’s painted and coated surfaces. I’m also interested in exploring how 3D modeling could support the documentation and future restoration of her intricately painted sculptures.
What’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever found while restoring an object?
While at the Menil, my colleague Kari Dodson and I found a Hellenic sculpture that had been previously repaired in the 1960s, and its hollow interior was filled with nails and miscellaneous metal hardware and epoxy so the small bust could be mounted on a metal post for display. It felt quite heavy when we first examined it, so we took an x-ray of the work to see why and found a mess of hardware inside! It was such a strange solution of everything on a handyman’s bench to prepare such a small sculpture for display.
What’s the most delicate material you’ve ever had to work with?
I’m not sure it’s the most delicate material I’ve worked on, but the old and brittle plastic bags in Niki’s tirs come to mind, the aged polyethylene plastic sheets are incredibly delicate and unforgiving, and very few treatment options have been developed for their repair. In a world trying to speed up the degradation of plastic bags, it’s a challenge to figure out ways to preserve them, and even more challenging to convey to people just how fragile plastic can be.
If you could watch any artwork being created in its original time, what would you pick?
I would love to have seen one of Charlotte Moorman’s performances. I can only imagine the creativity, candor, and bravery she brought to her performance art as a woman and talented cellist.
What does a typical day in conservation actually look like and what would surprise people most?
A typical day in conservation is rarely typical! My days range between research, planning, testing, and preventive care for an art collection to carrying out actual treatments of cleaning, repairing and restoring. My general goal is ensure an art collection is and appears to be well-cared for. This might involve planning for the whole collection (perhaps storage or climate control), as well as hyper local tasks of dusting the surface of a single work or identifying a particular stain on its surface and testing cleaning methods for how to best remove it. I think what surprises people most is the amount of time that goes into decision-making for how to treat an artwork, it is rarely straightforward and requires quite a lot of deliberation, consultation, and research.
Is there ever a point where it’s better not to restore something?
Certainly, in the world of conservation there are many approaches that fall under the umbrella term of “conservation,” including preventive conservation, interventive treatment, repair, restoration, replication, etc. In assessing the best solution for a condition issue sometimes the best course of action is to not intervene at all and to instead employ preventive measures to safeguard the work into the future by adjusting what’s around the artwork instead of the artwork itself.
What’s one tool you use that people wouldn’t expect?
Porcupine quills may be one of my favorite and surprising tools to use in art conservation. They have an ideal hardness, a slight flexibility, a hydrophobic and smooth outer surface and a sharp point that often make them the perfect tool.
What motivates you to keep growing in this field?
I am fascinated with the networks of care we can build to preserve cultural heritage. These networks are built with people from all different backgrounds like conservators, fabricators, collectors, artists, scientists, humanists, and the general public and when brought together they can develop extraordinary approaches for the conservation of an artwork.
Welcome to the Niki Charitable Art Foundation team Joy! We are pleased to have you join our organization and look forward to the expertise, perspective, and contributions you will bring to our continued success.