Art world adjusts to lighting switch from incandescents to LEDs

Barbara Jones decided to put the new LED lights to the test. When officials at the Westmoreland Museum of Art debated replacing its halogen bulb fixtures with a more efficient but expensive LED system, Jones, the museum's chief curator, wondered whether the bulbs would provide the same quality of lighting. So she instructed staff to hang several oil-on-canvas paintings, including George Hetzel's “Two Young Fishermen in a Summer Landscape,” and bathed them in LED light.

For visitors and staff accustomed to seeing the paintings under halogen bulbs, Jones said, “the response was incredible.”