Meet the conservator.

Cynthia Schwarz is the Founder and Chief Conservator of Take Care Conservation, with over 20 years of experience caring for paintings in museum collections. Trained first as a painter, she holds a BFA in Painting from the Rhode Island School of Design and later earned her MS in Painting Conservation from the Winterthur/University of Delaware Program in Art Conservation. Before founding Take Care, she served as a senior conservator at the Yale University Art Gallery.

Cynthia specializes in the conservation of modern and contemporary paintings, with particular expertise in the structural and aesthetic treatment of works on canvas. Her background as both an artist and conservator gives her a deep sensitivity to materials, surface, and intent.

A peer-reviewed Professional Member of the American Institute for Conservation (AIC), Cynthia is committed to the highest ethical standards in her field. She co-chairs AIC’s Ethics Core Documents Review Task Force and is a past chair of the Paintings Specialty Group. Her work has been widely shared through lectures, teaching, and publications.

Cynthia is a first-generation American and the daughter of Colombian immigrants. She believes that material culture connects us to our communities, histories, and shared humanity—and that caring for artworks can be a deeply meaningful and even healing act. She would love to talk with you about your aspirations for your collection.