Vandalised Gainsborough back at National Gallery

Gainsborough’s The Morning Walk (1785) was back on display at London’s National Gallery in late March—ten days after a 63-year-old man slashed the painting with a screwdriver. According to the museum, two long scratches penetrated both the paint surface and canvas support, but did not break through the lining. The treatment, led by senior conservator Paul Ackroyd, involved consolidating loose paint, filling, retouching and applying a varnish. “If you were in the gallery now looking at this picture you’d be able to appreciate it at least as well as before, with no evidence of damage,” Larry Keith, the gallery’s head of conservation, told the Financial Times.