#8: Humidity’s Slow Damage to Raphael
In Rome, Raphael’s The Deposition showed how dangerous moisture can be even without a flood or broken pipe. The 1507 panel painting, held at the Galleria Borghese, was affected by humidity problems linked to climate-control failure, and the concern was serious because wood and paint respond to air in ways visitors cannot always see. A room may look calm while the material inside a painting is swelling, softening, or shifting. That is the unsettling thing about environmental damage. It does not always announce itself with a crash. It works slowly, almost politely, until warping or surface changes reveal that something has gone wrong.
