A possible shipwreck

So before Christmas I was asked by a gal in town if I could fix her painting's frame.  I asked her to bring it in and I would take a look at it.  She brought me a Ferdinand Worms lithograph on tin print.  I had never even heard about this type of artwork, let alone seen or touch one before.

She could tell me that the painting was of the ship that her father had come over to this country on and had been purchased a long time ago.  Basically she said her dad had it hanging on his wall as long as she could remember and then it went to a family member, then her sister and now she was the owner of it.  But she didn't know anything about the artist.  So I had to do some research.

The reason she was bringing it to me is that she had tried to clean it with oven cleaner.  And that had caused the paint to strip around the edge of the frame.  But I was scared to death to touch it.

I started with my research.  I learned that is was painted by Ferdinand Worms in about 1913 and then put onto these tin lithographs with this faux wood grain frame.  It was all on one painting and from what I learned could be worth up to $1500 if it was in mint condition.  Hers was anything but mint condition but could still be worth about $300.  But she was determined to just have the frame redone and that it would be a family piece from here on out.

This is the painting in mint condition.

This was what hers looked like.  If you look in the upper left corner you can see the destruction the oven cleaner had on the tin frame.  Also this image gives you a pretty good look at the faux wood grain.

This is my final restoration.  I picked a flat metal spray paint to match the ship and I hand painted in all of the letters and the bronze trim by the letters and the edging.

She finally had to call me to give me the push to finish it, but once I got started I learned that it was not that difficult to do and was actually kind of fun.  It took about 3 -4 coats of paint to cover up the oven cleaner damage.  In the end it didn't take me very long either, so it just goes to show you shouldn't be scared of a project.