Del and Rodney would make a better job of it
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Have you seen professional art restorers at work? They absolutely can. But it’s an art of subtlety. They will repaint portions of the image but usually it’s tiny areas where they have resown the canvas over a tear or where the paint has flaked off. Usually a restorer just carefully cleans a painting which with a swab, can take months.
Edit: I think I misread your “anyone” as “anyone at all” while you probably meant “anyone off the street”. Sorry about that
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I respectfully disagree. The original artists probably didn’t intend to have their paintings go darker over time for example or the boards to warp and buckle the canvas. It’s absolutely fine to stabilise artworks and to undo the ravages of time as long as you don’t add anything.
In the same vein cathedrals are constant building sites even today. If we didn’t constantly replace damaged stonework we would be looking at picturesque ruins today. Stonehenge was once much more delapidated. Fallen over stones were restored four times in the 20th century alone. Would we really want it to be a pile of stones, none on top of the other? Nearly any historical object or place you can think of is in its current form because of heritage management and restoration. Or do you really prefer this version of the Sutton Hoo helmet to this? I don’t know the original maker but I’m fairly certain I can tell you their answer.
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Paintings oxidize badly over time depending on what was in the air where they were kept, and some materials used as mediums for painting are inherently unstable.
In the case of one painting my cousin worked on, where I assisted in a capacity, the painting was very large, and just the weight of the paint and canvas was enough to buckle and break the original frame over time. This was a very valuable piece, I’m told in low millions for value if I remember right.
I ended up making a solid billet stainless steel brace with 12 holes for special screws to re-brace the original frame to just support the painting. Worked well from her report.
So, sometimes even the painting itself was made with materials that degrade or harm the item itself after only a short time, and repairs are required to salvage very expensive pieces. Something rare crumpled into a pile of paint and canvas on the floor doesn’t tend to be worth as much, or create something pleasing to look at.
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Was going to say, that’s the movie.
The collector probably went with the furniture restorer because he was cheap. Competent paintings restorers and conservators are expensive.
I visited an art storage facility once, and noticed only a small portion of the artwork was housed in proper containers while most of it was in cheap cardboard containers. I asked the guy showing us around about it, and all he said was that you’d be surprised how many people will spend $20,000 on a painting but refuse to spend $200 to take proper care of it.
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Okay, you win this debate. Oh, and thanks a LOT for sending me down a Wikipedia hole. It’s not like I needed to actually get WORK done today.
/s
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This is the era of “distrusting egghead experts” or anybody with an education. I won’t point fingers at the most obvious proponent of this Idiot’s Manifesto viewpoint… but the second pic looks kind of like his present wife.
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I knew that image made me uncomfortable for a reason. You nailed it! 
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Leonardo Da Vinci was a restless experimenter, always looking for new ways to do things. The result, unfortunately, is that his colors suffered more than many of his contemporaries, and some of his biggest projects simply fell apart.
**** (combining two comments here for polite reasons ****)
From my years in the field, here’s my professional impression of what we’re seeing:
LEFT: The original job the artist turned in.
RIGHT TOP: The client’s verbal description that he worked from.
RIGHT BOTTOM: The final version after the artist was taken off the job and the client handed the board off to his nephew to fix.
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oops started a comment and didnt finish it that looked weird
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