A STUDY ON DEVELOPMENT OF CRACKS ON PAINTINGS OVER THE past 10
years there have been substantial developments in research on
the mechanical behavior of paintings. The knowledge of processes
leading to mechanical failure of paintings materials and their
properties has been greatly enhanced through pioneering work by
Mecklenburg (1982). It has been established that environmental
changes induce dramatic responses in fabric and size. The layer
of size is responsible for stress development during humidity
decrease; high stiffness of fabric dominates in high humidity.
The most brittle component of the composite—aged oil paint—fails
when movements in the supporting size and fabric exceed its
rupture strains. Stress distribution on paintings and the
resulting cracks in the paint layer were simulated on a computer
with the Finite Element Method (FEM) (Kilpatrick 1980; Colville
et al. 1982). Elastic properties of materials were assumed and
based on uniaxial tests. In this work the humidity-induced
movements were observ