Scientific Investigation of Contemporary Pastel Painting by Roberto Sebastian Matta: Characterization of Original Materials through Multispectral Imaging and Spectroscopic Techniques

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Please see the attached file for comments on your interesting paper. I suggest that you give the formulae of the pigments you identify in addition to the useful list of elements in the table. The main points are:

1) Please clarify your description of pastels; I agree the naming and use of words is somewhat confusing, but it's actually less confusing now than it was in the 18th century.

2) As far as your experimental design is concerned I am surprised that you seem to have relied on published or online work and do not seem to have carried out any preliminary study or testing of the non-invasive methods you used on any standard pigment samples yourselves; why was this? Or had you done it on some previous occasion? I think some explanation is needed here.

3) Are you sure that no gum or other binder could be detected in the Rembrandt pastel by FTIR?

Other points are in the text.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

thank you for the positive evaluation of out paper and for the comments and suggestions that certainly improved the quality of the paper.

We modified the manuscript according to your requests by highlighting the changes in red characters.

Detailed answers to each of the your comments are supplied in the attached file.

Thank you again

Claudia Pelosi (corresponding author)

On behalf of all authors.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper on scientific investigation of a contemporary pastel painting by Roberto Sebastian Matta is very interesting, but it needs some improvements. 

1. The calibration methods of Raman and infrared spectroscopy shall be indicated. 

2. Figure 9 is not clear. 

3. Table 1 shall be reviewed. For instance, the point X3 is supposed to have Cu-phthalocyanine. However, the XRF of the same point does not reveal any trace of Cu. The same in X4. Lithophone is white, and it contains S. The table shall be improved, and a detailed explanation shall be added in the text. 

4. micro-Raman spectroscopy. The interpretation shall be improved. Point P3 shall be explained. Is it possible to compare point P3 with an XRF area? Why the two techniques did not detect the same points? 

5. Literature shall be improved. 

 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

thank you for the positive evaluation of out paper and for the comments and suggestions that certainly improved the quality of the paper.

We modified the manuscript according to the requests by highlighting the changes in red characters.

Detailed answers to each of the your comments are supplied in the attached file.

Thank you again

Claudia Pelosi (corresponding author)

On behalf of all authors.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

The authors have improved the manuscript according to the reviewers' indications. I believe the manuscript has the requirements to be published.