How Dalí's Amber Varnish May Have Caused This Painting To Decay

(MENAFN- USA Art News) Dalí's“The Temptation of Saint Anthony” Returns to View After Scientists Trace Its Paint Damage

Why do certain passages in Salvador Dalí's“The Temptation of Saint Anthony” (1946) look slightly thinned and roughened, while neighboring areas remain intact? A new technical study at the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium (RMFAB) in Brussels has tied the painting's localized deterioration to a specific combination of materials Dalí himself promoted: zinc white layered over lead white, finished with a natural resin varnish.

The investigation brought together an international team that examined the canvas with a battery of imaging and analytical tools. Their questions ranged beyond the central figure of Saint Anthony to details such as the rock in his hand, an angel set back in the landscape, and the distant architecture of El Escorial. In some instances, the work began with a straightforward but revealing step: comparing older photographs with more recent ones. That visual record suggested the bulk of the degradation occurred before the painting entered the Brussels museum's collection in 1965.

To understand what was happening at a microscopic and chemical level, researchers used macro X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy to map pigments across the surface. The analysis identified a palette that included strontium yellow, Ceruleum blue, cobalt blue, chromium-based greens, carbon black, earthy pigments, lead white (a mixture of cerussite and hydrocerussite), and zinc white.

The most conspicuous damage, the study found, clusters in areas where zinc white-rich paint layers sit on top of lead white-containing layers. In those zones, the zinc white appears to have migrated as its binder failed, a process that can leave paint films disrupted. Digital microscopy supported that conclusion, confirming physical disturbances in the paint layers where the zinc white is concentrated.

The pattern is not uniform, and that nuance matters.“Not all areas containing zinc white are affected,” the study noted.“Only those zinc-white-rich paint layers that are superimposed over lead white-containing layers display visible signs of deterioration.”

The findings also intersect with Dalí's own technical advice. In his 1948 book“50 Secrets of Magic Craftsmanship,” the Spanish artist Salvador Dalí (1904–1989) recommended precisely this approach, praising zinc white as the pigment with which“you will achieve the most absolute whites in your picture.” From a conservation standpoint, however, the chemistry can be unforgiving.

Varnish appears to be part of the story as well. Dalí extolled amber as a varnish in the same book, describing it as“sublime” and emphasizing its ability to integrate with the final paint layers. Yet the study cautions that natural resins, while valued for their optical qualities, can age unpredictably in the presence of certain inorganic pigments - including zinc white. The researchers also raised the possibility that Dalí may have been working with an unstable batch of material.

One of the more unexpected discoveries was a layer of chlorine on the painting's surface. Based on the materials involved, the team concluded it likely originated elsewhere and hypothesized it was deposited as the work traveled to Europe in 1947.

With the mechanisms behind the damage more clearly understood and the painting assessed as stable,“The Temptation of Saint Anthony” is now back on view at RMFAB - a reminder that Surrealism's most hallucinatory images can hinge on the quiet, stubborn realities of pigment, binder, and varnish.

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