Experimental research on the vibration characteristics of canvas and primed canvas of paintings

Paintings inevitably bear severe mechanical loads during transportation.Understanding the dynamic characteristics of paintings helps to avoid damage during transportation and to effectively slow down their aging.In this contribution, the vibration characteristics of canvas and primed canvas of paintings and their influencing factors are studied experimentally.For this reason, two dummy paintings with canvas in a common orientation and a tilted orientation are investigated, and an experimental setup using an excitation mechanism and a laser Doppler vibrometer is developed.In order to avoid changes of the modal parameters related to humidity or temperature, all experiments were conducted in a climate box.The modal parameters of dummy paintings are identified by means of experimental modal analysis.Also, the difference in modal properties of the two dummy paintings before and after applying the primer are compared.The identified modal parameters are used to reconstruct their eigenmodes.From the identified modal parameters a numerical model is derived, which is then compared to measurements.The comparison shows a good agreement, hence is a hint for the correctness of assuming a modal structure and the quality of the modal parameter identification.Lastly, with the help of the climate box, the influences of humidity and temperature on the eigenfrequencies of dummy paintings are studied.