The craft of art restoration has become important to art historians and museums, particularly when talking about older works of art that may have become damaged from smoke, yellowed from resin, or simply dirt-covered with age. Many paintings from the Medieval or Renaissance period appear faded, shadowed, and their colors muffled and darkened from years of storage, passing of hands, or from materials used that collected dust and mold.

Those who undergo the process of restoring a painting must be extremely cautious to make sure they do not damage the original paint or change the image but simply restore it to its former beauty. They need to wash the painting carefully in a solution that can remove the grunge but retain the original paint, form, brush strokes, and canvas.

The very idea of r…