Libby Ireland

Libby Ireland is a Lecturer in Conservation of Contemporary Art and Media and a practicing sculpture and installation art conservator. She has worked across private practice and museums, with a particular interest in developing collaborative documentation for complex artworks and improving the environmental sustainability of collection care practices. 

Her research focuses on the relationship between artists and museums, and conservation's role in caring for complex artworks which unsettle the traditional model of museum ownership. She also works with modern materials, most recently undertaking research into additively manufactured components, developing documentation templates to help capture technical information and prompt conversations that could inform future care. 

Libby graduated from Chelsea College of Art with a BA in Fine Art in 2013. After working with a mountmaking and conservation studio she went on to train as a conservator, completing the MA and MSc programmes at the Institute of Archaeology, UCL, in 2018. She has worked in private practice and with various institutions and charities, working as a sculpture and installation art conservator at Tate from 2018-2024. She continues to practice as a freelance conservator. 

Visit Libby's RPS Profile for the most up to date information.

Research

Libby has undertaken practice based research with modern materials, and exploring the relationship between artists and museums. 

Libby worked on the Tate research project Reshaping the Collectible: When Artworks Live in the Museum from 2020-22, undertaking practice based research into the acquisition and display of works by Ima-Abasi Okon and Richard Bell. This work explored the collaborative process of bringing artworks into museum collections, examining the relationship between artist, artwork and museum. Her research looked at how Okon's work shifted this relationship to one of host and guest, allowing for a reframing of the role of the conservator.

Recent work with modern materials includes research into additively manufactured objects. This involved co-development of documentation templates to aid with acquisition of additively manufactured components in artworks. These are designed to help gather technical information about fabrication and act as prompts for conversations which could aid in future care of the work. The research also included the analysis and artificial ageing of test pieces from Pio Abad and Frances Wadsworth Jones' work The Collection of Jane Ryan and William Saunders (2019) to inform conversations with the artists around future care. 

Specialisms
Contemporary art conservation, inherited practices in collection care, relationships between artists and museums, modern materials

Selected Publications

Lee, J., Ireland, L., Townsend, J.H., Ormsby, B., Bartoletti, A., Cane, D., Da Ros, S., King, R., del Gaudio, I. and Curran, K. (2023).
‘Exploring the Materials and Condition of 20th-Century Dolls in Zoe Leonard’s Mouth Open, Teeth Showing 2000’, Polymers 2023, 15(1), 34.

Ireland, L. (2022). ‘Learning through the Acquisition and Display of Works by Ima-Abasi Okon: Enacting Radical Hospitality through 
Deliberate Slowness’, Tate Papers, 35. 

Ireland, L. (2019). ‘Impact break behaviour of PMMA sheet: When damaged surfaces tell a story’, in Bechthold, T. (ed.) Future Talks 019: Surfaces: Lectures and workshops on technology and conservation of the modern. Future Talks (Conference) (11-13th November 2019 : Munich, Germany), Munich : Die Neue Sammlung, pp 123-130.

Teaching and Supervision

Libby teaches the following modules as part of the MSc in Conservation of Contemporary Art and Media:

Science of Contemporary Materials
Examining and Analysing Artworks
Conserving Complexity: Conservation of Contemporary Artworks
Studio practice: Conservation of contemporary materials