Cut construction and conservation: ethical issues with the highly interventive treatment of costume

Abstract

International conservation standards promote the invisibility of the conservator’s work in the biography of objects but the active treatment of objects often makes this impossible. Items of costume held in museums are particularly prone to these ethical dilemmas and demonstrate how current conservation techniques require that the conservator’s work become an active part of each object’s history. The conservation of costume can be challenging due to particular features of costume common to most collections. Fashion’s aesthetic role means that the visual nature of costume is especially important. As well the historic methods of consumption that result in alterations to a piece of costume over, what could be, a very long period of time presents a particular ethical dilemma about what period of an object’s history should be prioritised during treatment. Context is especially important for making these decisions in an ethical manner. The conservator must engage with other museum professionals to determine how the objects are consumed by museum visitors and what role the object plays in the exhibit and the collection before a potentially reconstructive treatment is judged appropriate. Conservators and museum professionals must also accept that reconstructive treatments change the innate nature of the object and that it will be affected by its time as a part of a museum collection.