Index
20
Centre de Restauració de Béns Mobles de Catalunya
INNOVATION & RESEARCH
PERE ROVIRA
Conservation-restoration interventions at the Els Munts site I VAGUELY REMEMBER THE FIRST TIME I CAME TO ELS MUNTS, TOWARDS THE END OF 1998, with Josep M. Xarrié and Eduard Porta In the mid-1990s, under the direction of Francesc Tarrats, excavations had resumed in the Roman villa of Els Munts, and the Restoration Centre paid a visit to see and assess the state of conservation of the mural paintings that had emerged during the excavation in the ambulatio rooms. At the entrance of the enclosure, at the time, on the hortus side, there were two caretakers dressed as officials, sitting on two beach chairs, at the foot of a carob tree, guarding the site, which was very unprotected then. It was not a coincidence or an administrative extravagance, but a reality that proved the importance of the site, and of what had been found there since the last excavations in the 1970s. Everywhere in the villa exuded luxury and comfort. Remains of the stones that had adorned it, from all corners of the Roman Empire, appeared everywhere and testified to the category and importance of this archaeological site. A reality that at the time did not seem like it, but that has become extremely obvious as it has been excavated and restored. During that first visit, we focused on the domus area to see the new mural paintings discovered in the cryptoportico area and its large mosaic. One of the guidelines that someone had given the archaeologists was that as soon as they discovered the mural paintings, to protect them with a gauze attached with Paraloid® B-72 resin, at that time the “manna” that saved and conserved the heritage. The recommendation was not bad, and in the eyes of a restorer it obeyed a specific temporary fastening criterion, to avoid risk of detachment. But this misunderstood detail led to protection being applied to the whole pictorial ensemble, regardless of the area, and turned the whole ensemble into a kind of wrapped present. Despite
RESCAT
this, the real problem was that these fabrics glued with resin spent too many years on the frescoes, apart from the fact that they were placed without properly cleaning dirt from the surface of the murals. What was supposed to be a temporary protection was prolonged in time, and created an added problem to the alteration itself of the outdoor frescoes. The mixture of acrylic resin with solid remains deposited on the surface forms a kind of hard and resistant film, difficult to remove as the resin becomes insoluble, and at the same time does not allow the painted walls to breathe naturally. So, one of the first immediate actions to be taken should have been to remove the fabrics (some of which were already beginning to come off) and especially the resin, which conditioned the stability and aesthetics of the fresco. Its removal, years later, did not lead to the total elimination of Paraloid®, since due to its strong adhesion it still remained all over the surface.
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Partial view of the gallery and the lower rooms of the domus, under the roof
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