Prof. Dr. Andrea Pataki-Hundt, a qualified conservator, teaches restoration and conservation of written materials, graphic art and book illumination at Cologne University of Applied Sciences. In RESTAURO, she talks about her work with students, her main areas of research and how it all began with an internship in painting conservation. Her heart beats for old books: Prof. Dr. Andrea Renate Pataki-Hundt […]
Prof. Dr. Andrea Pataki-Hundt, a qualified conservator, teaches restoration and conservation of written materials, graphic art and book illumination at Cologne University of Applied Sciences. In an interview with Restauro, she talks about her work with students, her research focus and how it all began with an internship in painting conservation
Her heart beats for old books: Prof. Dr. Andrea Pataki-Hundt has been Professor of Restoration and Conservation of Written Material, Graphics and Book Illumination at the TH Köln since 2017. But she also started small. “I first did an internship in the field of painting conservation at the Rosgarten Museum in Constance, then in Basel and then in Vienna at the Upper Belvedere,” explains Andrea Pataki-Hundt. This enabled her to gain an insight into all areas. She was most interested in the paper sector: to get to know the craft before studying, she did an apprenticeship as a bookbinder in Radolfzell. She then began her studies in the conservation and restoration of graphic art, archive and library materials at the State Academy of Fine Arts in Stuttgart.
Interplay of theory and practice
During and after her studies, Pataki-Hundt traveled abroad a lot. “There are highlights of book works in the USA. They have a very good sense of conservation there.” She has also restored works of art in Israel. “In Tbilisi, Georgia, there are not so many high-tech devices, but they love and appreciate their cultural assets, some of which are very old.” Today, the professor is able to use many of her contacts abroad for her students, who then also do internships there. The interplay of theory and practice that Andrea Pataki-Hundt realized in her own career is something she implements in her teaching: “We sometimes have very long lecture times of three-hour blocks, so it’s easy to combine the two: After a theoretical introduction, we go straight into the workshop and put what we’ve learned into practice. The students receive tailor-made work packages. This works very well in our subject because you can apply everything you’ve learned in theory, whether it’s dry cleaning or bleaching, leather deterioration or leather care.” This makes the subject more tangible.
Focus on adhesives
One focus of Andrea Pataki-Hundt’s research is adhesives: “I’m interested in how adhesives can be used. They are omnipresent, but more light needs to be shed on them.” Another area of research concerns artificial ageing. In order to properly restore historical material, such as an old leather strap, Andrea Pataki-Hundt is developing test pieces that should look exactly like the original through artificial ageing “I want to find out how artificial ageing can be even more closely imitated to naturally aged materials with climate control devices. The guidelines for artificial ageing are constantly fluctuating, as the reference measurements with naturally aged materials are becoming more and more refined,” explains Andrea Pataki-Hundt.
Since 2021 there is a podcast of the CICS of TH Köln. The conservation and restoration courses talk about their studies, report on projects and conduct interviews with professors, staff, students and alumni. In the first episode of the podcast, Prof. Dr. Andrea Renate Pataki-Hundt, head of the Conservation and Restoration of Documents, Graphics, Photography and Book Illumination course, talks about the characteristics of conservators and more. Listen in!
In this video from May 2021 you can see a lecture by Andrea Pataki-Hundt on paper conservation followed by a tour of the conservation workshops at the CICS (Cologne Institute of Conservation Sciences) / Institut für Restaurierungs- und Konservierungswissenschaft, Cologne:
