Ferrara, Palace of Ludovico il Moro, wall paintings’ restoration
Date
Friday June 24th, 2016
DATA SHEET
AUTHOR:
Benvenuto Tisi known as “il Garofano”
DATING:
XVI century
POSITION:
Ferrara, Building of Ludovico il Moro, Treasure Room, Joseph’s histories Room, Prophets and Sibyls Room, Chapel.
CUSTOMER:
Bologna Archaeological Superintendence, Arch. Carla Francis (2000/2001), Dr. Cetti Muscolino (2006), Arch. Andrea Alberti (2006)
INTERVENTION TIME:
2000/2001 – 2006
THE PROBLEM
The problematic preservation history of the Palace has left clear traces in the pictorial context which decorates salons and, despite the suffered adversity, the context still has sections substantially intact.
About the Treasure Room, such damages find a reason into big problems caused by static instability of the vault and into attempts, implemented during the middle of the nineteenth century, to rehabilitate and dab this “deep depression”: propping with axes and beams in direct contact with the paint film, sagging plaster and cement, etc.
Equally problematic was the situation of the other Rooms’ paintings where, during the last war, a bomb – fell on the division wall of the Room with the Stories of Joseph and the one with the Sibyls and the Prophets -has caused the collapse of a wide portion of the two vaults. Restored during the postwar period, the ceilings showed a graphical revival of the architectural partition.
THE METHOD
In addition to the conservative restoration work, and besides the restoration of adhesion and cohesion of the paint film and preparatory layers, these environments paintings have forced “complicated” methodological choices to be adopted, above all cause of the wide presence of stucco plaster and cement and their treatment.
As a whole, since the beginning of the construction site the pictorial reintegration has appeared as the problematic issue to be solved.
The choice that was made, in agreement with the Work Management team, was to lace up the intervention of the Casanova during the thirties: to reintegrate in an analogical way everything that could be re-built, based on not removed traces and existent reproducible parts of the painting.
Furthermore, this choice also was in step with the one settled down and applied during of our intervention in the other rooms of the palace, where the vast repaintings present on both the vault and the lunettes have not been removed.
