Patrick Henry Bruch (1881-1936), American Modernist painter, has been the subject of research by art historians William C. Agee and Barbara Rose, who co-authored his catalogue raisonné. Bruce was an extremely complex personality and this was reflected in his paintings, of which barely 100 paintings remain. These are only a fragment of an oeuvre which point to his being one of the masters of 20th-century art. What little Bruce himself did not destroy has fared badly in the years since his death, first through neglect and more recently through unwarranted and irresponsible alterations. Sometime between January 1964 and September 1965, before they were sold, twelve paintings (almost fifty percent of the extant late work) suffered deliberate erasures and alterations to the pencil drawing and color shapes that were an intrinsic part of the late canvases. The motive was apparently to make them appear more polished or finished , but the result is that we now are left with significant changes from the original state of the paintings that rob them of essential qualities. Fortunately in 1964, prior to their sale, Agee saw the paintings and requested photographs by taken. These paintings are now in major collections across the country and abroad. This paper deals with the conservation treatment of the reconstruction of Nature Morte, c. 1923-24, owned by the Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI. The treatment was to undo what had been done in France. Working with William Agee and a before-alteration photograph, and with bits of information that were still left on the painting, the treatment proceeded. Photographic projection, comparison, and interpretation were the keys to this restoration. Now completed, the treatment will mean a re-evaluation of the other extant Bruces, many of which have been treated in the last ten years. The treatment also raises aesthetic and ethical questions in a conservation treatment.