Qualitative and quantitative deterioration assessment of Thai mural paintings and wall plasters from the Thailand 2011 Great Flood

Abstract

Thailand suffered from the Great Flood in 2011. Wat Pa Klang Thung, located in the Province of Pathum Thani, was submerged for four months, which caused serious deterioration to the mural paintings and wall plasters of its ordination hall. This article aims to discuss the results of the qualitative and quantitative assessment and analysis of the deterioration problems that occurred on the mural paintings and walls after the flood. The assessment was carried out with: 1) photographic surveys and manual condition assessments over existing architectural drawings and/or printed rectified photographs; 2) digitisation of the recorded deterioration problems using AutoCAD; and 3) quantitative assessment of deterioration degrees using AutoCAD and Microsoft Excel. The assessment yielded two sets of accurate deterioration data which were 1) a set of maps of the mural and plaster deterioration sorted by types of problems, and 2) a set of quantitative assessment of the deterioration. The deterioration maps could be used to identify the locations where each deterioration problem occurred, while the quantitative deterioration assessment could be used to more accurately provide a comparison of degrees of deterioration and to rank the susceptibility to deterioration of the walls compared to conventional subjective measurement.

KEYWORDS:

• Mural conservation
• Condition assessment
• Deterioration of plaster
• Condition mapping
• Deterioration calculation
• Quantitative condition assessment

Acknowledgements

I would like to express my appreciation to SEAMEO SPAFA and the Cultural Emergency Response of Prince Claus Fund for funding the project of Disaster Relief Actions for the Ordination Hall of Wat Pa Klang Thung, Mueang District, Pathum Thani Province, Thailand which my work was a part of. I also would like to sincerely thank to Arjarn Chiraporn Aranyanark for her advice and support and to my assistant team including Nattawan Thaidee, Piriya Pittayawattanachai, Anurak Chamnanchang and Teerayoot Suwaluk for their extraordinary work. I feel very grateful to Silpakorn University and the Faculty of Architecture as well as Dr. M R Rujaya Abhakorn on the behalf of SEAMEO SPAFA for supporting my travel allowance to participate and present my work in the 4th APTCCARN Meeting on Embracing Cultural Material Conservation in the Tropics in Taiwan on 27 November 2015.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 The condition assessment was firstly reported in Watsantachad et al. (2012b), Assessments of Current Conditions of the Mural Painting.

2 The images were adapted from Watsantachad et al. (2012a), Assessments of Current Conditions of the Mural Painting.

3 It is to be noted that this calculation was merely based on the optical evidence assessment without any measurement instrument or laboratory analysis to measure actual moisture content retaining within the wall at the time of assessment. Hence, the calculations of damp area in this wall as well as in the others only showed the percentages of apparent dampness of the walls, not the amounts of their moisture contents.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Nuanlak Watsantachad

Dr. Nuanlak Watsantachad is an Associate Professor, the former Head of the Related Arts in Architecture Department, and the former Vice Dean of the Faculty of Architecture, Silpakorn University, Thailand. She completed her BArch from Chulalongkorn University, Thailand, her MS in Historic Preservation from the University of Pennsylvania, USA and her PhD in Conservation Studies from the University of York, UK. Her theses focused on sandstone and laterite conservation while her research relates to brick and lime mortar and plaster conservation. She carried out condition assessments of historic sites such as Cliff Palace, Mesa Verde National Park, USA and Mrigadayavan Palace, Thailand. She lectures in architectural and material conservation classes at Silpakorn University as well as at Chulalongkorn University and the University of York as a guest lecturer. She also works as a material conservation consultant for UNESCO Bangkok, the Fine Arts Department of Thailand, and the Thailand Research Fund.