Journal
ANGEWANDTE CHEMIE-INTERNATIONAL EDITION
Volume 54, Issue 12, Pages 3607-3610Publisher
WILEY-V C H VERLAG GMBH
DOI: 10.1002/anie.201411691
Keywords
degradation; pigments; red lead; tomography; X-ray diffraction
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Funding
- University of Antwerp
- BELSPO (Brussels) Project [S2-ART]
- FWO (Brussels)
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Red lead, a semiconductor pigment used by artists since antiquity, is known to undergo several discoloration phenomena. These transformations are either described as darkening of the pigment caused by the formation of either plattnerite (beta-PbO2) or galena (PbS) or as whitening by which red lead is converted into anglesite (PbSO4) or (hydro) cerussite (2PbCO(3)center dot Pb(OH)(2); PbCO3). X-ray powder diffraction tomography, a powerful analytical method that allows visualization of the internal distribution of different crystalline compounds in complex samples, was used to investigate a microscopic paint sample from a Van Gogh painting. A very rare lead mineral, plumbonacrite (3PbCO(3)center dot Pb(OH)(2)center dot PbO), was revealed to be present. This is the first reported occurrence of this compound in a painting dating from before the mid 20th century. It constitutes the missing link between on the one hand the photoinduced reduction of red lead and on the other hand (hydro) cerussite, and thus sheds new light on the whitening of red lead.
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