Sharing our knowledge
On Monday 15 August Sydney Metro and Silentworld Foundation welcomed archaeological conservators to their Yennora facility for Barangaroo Boat focused day. While we have been able to provide some smaller site tours and visits for interested parties, this day allowed us to share with our colleagues the exact progress and conservation plan for the Barangaroo Boat.
The purpose of the day was not to just inform attendees about what treatment had taken place and would occur in future, but rather was an opportunity for Silentworld Foundation to discuss the treatment so far, and reflect on which parts had worked and which hadn’t. Further research questions that were outside the scope of the current project were also proposed.
A range of talks, presentations and demonstrations
Kylie Seretis from Casey & Lowe and Cosmos Coroneos from Cosmos Archaeology gave an excellent background on the archaeological and historical context of the boat. This was followed by a talk about the principles of boat conservation, prepared by Ian Panter of York Archaeological Trust, given by Silentworld Foundation conservator Heather Berry, due to time differences.
Paul Hundley and Kieran Hosty, of the Australian National Maritime Museum, discussed the unwrapping and photography of timber elements. They were able to share useful information for future projects, for example, that geotextile was effective at maintaining moisture levels in the timbers, but that a capillary matting may be more appropriate in the future as the corrosion matrix of the iron impregnated timbers had incorporated fibres from the geotextile.
Heather Berry gave a talk that outlined how Ian Panter’s principles of conservation had been put into practice concerning the Barangaroo Boat. Takeaway lessons from this talk included appropriate materials for racking in tanks – using non-oily wood is best if one wants to control water content tightly – and the always relevant lesson in tolerance and compromise between archaeologists and conservators.
Renee Malliaros’ speech on scanning and annotation addressed similar lessons of the co-operation required to achieve a common goal, such as thorough documentation of each element.
Ian MacLeod gave an excellent pre-recorded talk about the principles of small finds conservation, which showed the guiding ideals behind our future small finds program for the boat.
After a thorough background in the rationale of treatment of the boat and in-depth discussions of how this played out in practicality, the morning session concluded.
Afternoon sessions were hands-on and saw attendees condition report timbers using a range of methods that were outlined in the morning sessions. The other practical session included a workshop on how annotation of timbers using 3D scans could be used to create a detailed condition report.
Silentworld Foundation would like to thank all attendees for coming to the workshop, and for their comments, questions and shared experiences.
