from Hacker News

Have a damaged painting? Restore it in just hours with an AI-generated “mask”

by WithinReason on 6/12/25, 5:59 PM with 58 comments

• by Daub on 6/15/25, 3:18 AM

  I will reserve judgement on this for the simple fact is that att conservation has been responsible for a huge amount of Art vandalism.

  The 'restoration' of the cistine chapel ceiling was funded by a Japanese tv company. The cheapest approach was chosen which assumed that michelangelo made absolutely no corrections to his fresco using applied paint. It is perfectly obvious that this was a mistaken assumption, in the process removing many of the artists original work. I can upload some slides later if anyone is interested.

  In victorian times many classic sculptures were scrubbed of their original paint and their stonework bleached, just in order to serve the tastes of the time.

  And let us not forget that modern conservators will add or remove elements according to the clients taste. Eg change the flag of a ship from British to American.

• by contravariant on 6/14/25, 11:44 PM

  The restoration method is more interesting than the AI, but claiming it uses AI is probably necessary to get funding for it.

• by bee_rider on 6/15/25, 12:44 AM

  Funny aside, they have an odd ligature to for “fi” on that site. It shows up in iOS Safari at least.

  > Kachkine acknowledges that, as with any restoration project, there are ethical issues to consider, in terms of whether a restored version is an appropriate representation of an artist’s original style and intent. Any application of his new method, he says, should be done in consultation with conservators with knowledge of a painting’s history and origins.

  A sort of interesting thought, “what was the artist’s intent, should be recover the painting,” is a well known question nowadays. It would be sort of funny if current artists would just write down what sort of restoration plans they are ok with. I wonder how many would say “just do what you will do people can enjoy it.”

  Although, one could argue maybe that the damage which occurs to artwork as it ages also tells a historical story. Perhaps that story doesn’t just belong to the artist, and so restoring the work could be questionable even with their permission. I’m sure this is well-trod ground.

• by t43562 on 6/15/25, 8:34 AM

  Unless the result is a form of protection to the painting then why not "just" reprint the whole painting and not touch the original at all?

• by matt3210 on 6/15/25, 6:08 AM

  Why not just generate a new painting with AI? How much of the painting has to be covered with a mask before it’s not a painting anymore?

• by ecocentrik on 6/15/25, 12:36 PM

  It changes the medium. Even if it works perfectly, doesn't alter luminosity and perfectly preserves the art under the wrap, it's still shrink wrapped art and alters the experience of viewing the work.

• by omoikane on 6/15/25, 12:37 AM

  > "Because there's a digital record of what mask was used, in 100 years, the next time someone is working with this, they'll have an extremely clear understanding of what was done to the painting"

  Reminds me of https://xkcd.com/1683/

  Whatever digital record format they use, they will probably need to rewrite it once every few years to ensure that it's still readable.

• by b0a04gl on 6/15/25, 3:35 AM

  but most of the lift looks mechanical : masking, polymer filling, pigment blending. if ai's involved, it's probably color inference or mask prediction. nothing wrong with that, just feels overstated. curious if they benchmarked against expert restorers on visual fidelity. and who signs off on historical accuracy here? ai or the human behind the brush?

• by not_your_mentat on 6/15/25, 3:54 PM

  Infill the damaged parts of this painting with exactly no elephants.

• by t0bia_s on 6/15/25, 7:37 PM

  Would be interesting to use it on old photographs restoration.

• by zelphirkalt on 6/15/25, 12:21 PM

  No thank you, that would destroy the value and art of the painting.

• by absurdo on 6/15/25, 12:23 AM

  No links to Baumgartner from HN yet? Strange.

• by amelius on 6/15/25, 12:19 AM

  I hope the AI will not generate hands with seven fingers ...