Butlletí <<Rescat>> núm. 31 del Centre de Restauració de Béns Mobles de Catalunya_English

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Summer 2017

INTERVIEW

Monsignor Jesús Tarragona i Muray Page 3

CONSERVATION RESTORATION

Romanesque cathedral belfry window, St Mary of Solsona Page 11

Conservation and restoration of Our Lady of Patronage from Cardona Page 18

Exterior decoration of the Romanesque chapel at Castellterçol Castle Page 22

Restoration of the arches in the cloister of the Monastery of St Mary of Bellpuig de les Avellanes Page 27

Conservation and restoration of pieces of orfèvrerie from the Diocesan Museum in Urgell to update its museographic discourse Page 34

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CONSERVATION AND RESTORATION

OUR LADY OF PATRONAGE FROM CARDONA

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EDITORIAL

THE CORPUS VITREARUM OF CATALONIA The seventeenth International Congress of the History of Art hosted by Amsterdam in 1952 resolved to create the Corpus Vitrearum Medii Aevi (CVMA).

Two years later, Dr Hans R. Hahnloser secured sponsorship of CVMA by the Union Académique International (UIA, in English, International Union of Academies), a federation of scientific institutions and academies based in Brussels that aspires to international cooperation.

The Institute of Catalan Studies (IEC, for its initials in Catalan) has formed a part of the federation since 1922 and has assumed the task of preparing and publishing the research on Catalan stained glass.

In 1958, Joan Ainaud de Lasarte PhD, secretary of the Barcelona committee, presented the programme of the first volumes devoted to Catalonia.

A permanent team of specialists was set up in 1979 formed by Joan Vila-Grau, Ramon Roca i Junyent and Antoni Vila Delclòs, under the supervision of Ainaud and with the participation of external collaborators.

The objective of the programme was the scientific study of all the stained-glass windows in Catalan

religious and civilian buildings of the mediaeval period, up until and inclusive of the sixteenth century, and their state of conservation. It also contemplated a subsequent series of publications.

Four volumes were published between the years 1985 and 1997: Els vitralls de l’església de Santa Maria del Mar de Barcelona, Els vitralls de la catedral de Girona, Els vitralls del monestir de Santes Creus i la catedral de Tarragona, Els vitralls de la catedral de Barcelona i del monestir de Pedralbes. The fifth volume appeared in 2014, in two parts: Els vitralls de la catedral de la Seu d’Urgell i de la col·legiata de Santa Maria de Cervera and Estudis entorn del vitrall a Catalunya. The volume entitled Vitralls medievals de Catalunya was produced in 2000.

In 1999, the Corpus Vitrearum decided to study the stained-glass windows made in Catalonia between the seventeenth century and 1930.

With this new objective in mind, the IEC sought an agreement with the Ministry of Culture of the Catalan government. Signed in 2009, the agreement guaranteed the financing of the new programme, the approval of technical criteria for drawing up the inventory of Catalan stained-glass windows, and the establishment of a specific course of action according to the state of conservation and historical value of each ensemble.

Xavier Barral, scientific advisor during the first few years, Antoni Vila, technical director, and Anna Vila, technical collaborator, were then able to compile the inventory of the provinces of Barcelona and Girona; under the scientific direction of Núria Gil and Sílvia Cañellas, the inventory of the province of Lleida is currently in progress. Francesc Fontbona and Joaquim Garriga are scientific advisers to the Corpus Vitrearum.

A project as ambitious as the Corpus is a must for a culturally advanced country to deepen its knowledge of its artistic heritage and ensure its preservation. Àngels Solé. Director of CRBMC

Stained-glass window with the Virgin Mary and St Michael the Archangel, Santa Maria del Mar church, Barcelona. Photograph taken from the book Els vitralls medievals de l’església de Santa Maria del Mar a Barcelona, Institut d’Estudis Catalans, Barcelona, 1985, p. 47

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© Museu de Lleida: diocesà i comarcal (Toni Prim)

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INTERVIEW

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Ramon Solé, Conservator and restorer of cultural assets

MONSIGNOR JESÚS TARRAGONA I MURAY Lifelong honorary representative of the artistic and cultural heritage of the bishopric of Lleida, Emeritus Canon of the New Cathedral of Lleida, Honorary Prelate of His Holiness the Pope, Honorary President of the Friends of the Old Cathedral of Lleida, and academician at the Royal Catalan Academy of Fine Arts of St George in Barcelona.

AN ESSENTIAL FIGURE IN THE SAFE KEEPING AND RESTORATION OF ARTISTIC AND CULTURAL HERITAGE OF THE BISHOPRIC OF LLEIDA BORN IN TORRELAMEU IN 1925, MONSIGNOR JESÚS TARRAGONA WITNESSED ONE OF THE MOST TRAGIC AND DESTRUCTIVE EPISODES SUFFERED BY THE BISHOPRIC OF LLEIDA, AND BECAME A KEY PLAYER IN ITS RECOVERY

Since being appointed diocesan representative of artistic heritage by Bishop Aurelio del Pino in 1996, you have been a capital figure in the recovery of the historical and artistic heritage of the bishopric of Lleida. Nevertheless, you have always said that you consider yourself above all a monsignor. Could you tell us briefly what you mean?

Well, I’m a priest. We could say I chose to dedicate my life to the Lord, to his service. That’s all. Two of my brothers at home were already priests, and then, after the war, I completed a course at the seminary.

What about your relationship with art?

I entered the seminary in 1935, and while I was there – after the Spanish Civil War – I fell in love with art.

When I was sixteen, the vice-chancellor, Monsignor Laureano Castán Lacoma, who went on to become Bishop of Sigüenza, sent me to the former St Mary’s Hospital, today the Institute of Lleida Studies (IEI, for its initials in Catalan), where the entire stone collection of the museum was kept. Taking Monsignor Armengol’s catalogue as a starting point, I had to find the pieces that had been grouped together during the war and sort them out.

For the benefit of younger generations, what role did the diocesan art collections play?

They were useful for teaching the seminarians about www.centrederestauracio.gencat.cat

art, sacred art. In fact, one of the subjects was sacred art. We learnt how Bishop Josep Meseguer gathered all these pieces, that were not intended for worship purposes, in order to create the seminary museum.

The first pieces brought by Bishop Meseguer were in the library, but as they grew in number they were taken down to the ground floor where the museum would eventually open. Designed by architect Joan

IN THOSE DAYS, THE COLLECTIONS OF DIOCESAN ART WERE USEFUL FOR TEACHING THE SEMINARIANS ABOUT SACRED ART Bergós, the museum was housed in the northern wing of the building, and structured by the façade that looked on to the boulevard and by a part of the façade that looked on to Carrer Ramon i Cajal. Before the war, it was well established on this site. The plans of the original museum building are currently stored in the Museum of Lleida.

What was Sacred Archaeology, and how did it relate to the seminary museum?

Sacred Archaeology was one of the subjects we were RESCAT

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The Tarragona family on the day of the first mass offered by Monsignor Jesús Tarragona. © Monsignor Jesús Tarragona

taught at the seminary. The textbook, by F. P. Naval, covered archaeology, art history, artistic styles, attire, etc. It obviously had connections with the museum, as the theories explained in the book could be contrasted with the works assembled by Bishop Meseguer to further the practical knowledge of the seminarians.

So, they had a museum inside the seminary where they could attend hands-on classes.

Yes, yes, it was totally hands-on. Vice-chancellor Monsignor Laureano Castán was in charge of the collection. But the seminary museum wasn’t the Diocesan Museum, it was the seminary museum and was called the Archaeological Museum of the Conciliar Seminary of Lleida. The Diocesan Museum received this name after the Spanish Civil War. Was this museum exclusive to seminarians?

No, people from outside the seminar could also visit.

Before the war, the person in charge of the museum was Monsignor Pere Armengol, who had drawn up the catalogue of the work; before him, Monsignor Joan Fuster had been the person responsible. The chancellor appointed the seminarians who would be in charge of the museum when it welcomed visitors, and on other occasions.

Do you remember who was in charge of the works in the Archaeological Museum in the seminary?

Who restored them?

Before the war, Monsignor Pere Armengol was responsible for the works. I don’t know who repaired them, because there is no documentary evidence of any of the pieces having been restored before the conflict.

What we do know is that Monsignor Joan Fuster drew up RESCAT

Course of 1943-1944. The seminarians with Bishop Villar. © Monsignor Jesús Tarragona

the report entitled ‘El Museo Arqueológico Diocesano de Lérida’, that in 1919 was awarded a prize by the Commonwealth of Catalonia. The prize money was spent on improvements to the museum.

Not so long ago, the images of the destruction of the city of Palmyra and of other art works carried out by ISIS sent shockwaves through the international community. And eighty years ago, when you were a student at the seminary, you experienced identical events when the seminary museum was plundered and a large part of its collection was destroyed.

Could you tell us about that?

I lived with my parents on Carrer Comandant Baget, now called Joan Baget, and the back of our house looked on to the seminary. At that time there were no other buildings nearby, only orchards and allotments.

We were indoors one day and suddenly heard strong

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of art abroad, they would have raised enough money to finance the war and many of the works would have been saved. But all they had in mind was destruction and death. Destruction and death.

After the war, the bishopric did nothing as there was no conservator at the seminary, and never had been, and no museum director either for that matter, until I

St Paul’s parish church was burnt and devastated. The sculpture of the patron saint of the façade is secured before being tossed down to the ground. July 1936. © Ramon Rius Collection.

IEI Audiovisual Service

Destruction of the Gothic sculpture of the Virgin Mary on the façade of the former St Mary’s Hospital. July 1936. © Ramon Rius Collection.

IEI Audiovisual Service

blows as the sculptures of the apostles in the imposing doorway to the Old Cathedral were struck with mallets.

I could hear the noise of the breakage from home. Then, the fragments of the sculptures were scattered in the seminary vegetable garden to cover a ditch.

After the Spanish Civil War, the spectacle of destruction that unfolded in the parishes belonging to the bishopric of Lleida must have been heartrending. How was the artistic heritage of the bishopric recovered and safeguarded?

Most of the altarpieces and wooden sculptures in the churches and the cathedral were burnt. Only those kept in a few mountain villages were saved because the residents agreed to hide them. They burnt other things such as benches, for instance, to pretend that they had destroyed the art works in case those who were set on devastating the churches paid them a visit.

But these works had already been concealed, which is why most cultural heritage was saved in the mountainous area of the bishopric, whereas in the plains practically nothing was left. The destruction was brutal. If only they had thought of selling the works

Sculptures of the apostles from the Doorway of the Apostles at the Old Cathedral in Lleida, on display at the Archaeological Museum in the Conciliar Seminary of Lleida in 1917. These sculptures were destroyed at the onset of the Spanish Civil War Photo: Salvany Collection. Biblioteca de Catalunya.

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was assigned to the position. I was the first to carry out those tasks. I had a lot of faith in the Borràs workshop, as they helped me a lot with all sorts of things. They made most of the altars and altarpieces we now have.

Around the year 1967 or 1968, as soon as the bishop had appointed me the cultural heritage delegate, I requested permission and funds to excavate the area where the sculptural fragments of the apostles from the Old Cathedral had been scattered. It was behind the seminary, to the west, where there was a vegetable garden and a ditch. Some of the pieces had been thrown into that ditch.

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Centre de Restauració de Béns Mobles de Catalunya

The excavation we undertook enabled us to recover a few of the fragments of the apostles; not all of them, because they also scattered some of the pieces around the land that is now the street we know as Bisbe Meseguer. I drew up a list of the fragments and indicated the apostle to which they could have originally belonged. But not all the pieces were recovered, and many have yet to be found.

You said that the vice-chancellor of the seminary sent you to the former St Mary’s Hospital to identify the works that had ended up there. Could you tell us why they had been taken there and where they were from?

Well to put it simply, in the early days of the revolution a team was set up to save the cultural heritage. It was formed by artists who collected and saved works of art in the name of the Catalan Republican government.

Antoni Garcia Lamolla, Enric Crous-Vidal, Antoni Bergós and Salvador Roca Lletjós gathered the works that had been dispersed, they even visited villages to collect them, and took them to the Museum of the People that was housed in the former St Mary’s Hospital, opposite the cathedral. The documents of the Catalan government that identified the pieces enabled them to collect the works; among others, they recovered fragments of Our Lady of the Bruise from St Paul’s church, other fragments of the figure of the Virgin from the façade of the former St Mary’s Hospital, etc. They recovered as much as they could and did a very good job too, because without them the tapestries from Lleida Cathedral and a significant part

THE SIXENA CHAIR ... COULDN’T EVEN BE TOUCHED BECAUSE ALL THAT WAS LEFT OF IT WAS A THIN LAYER OF WOOD AND THE PAINT of the cathedral’s archive would all have been lost.

Later on, the town’s newspaper and periodicals library was founded and housed in the Church of the Blood on Carrer Sant Antoni. It accommodated the archive of the bishopric, those of the Marian Academy and the Chapter House, and the archives that been saved from various parishes.

Subsequently, during the bombings of Lleida, these collections were taken out of the city to Butsènit chapel, from where Franco’s troops took them to the church of Our Lady of Carmen in Saragossa. After the war, the works returned to Lleida and were displayed in an exhibition at the former St Mary’s Hospital. I identified those made of stone, because the others had already been returned. The altarpieces, paintings, etc., were stacked in the Conciliar Seminary.

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Ramon Borràs in a room on the second floor of the former St Mary’s Hospital in the nineteen forties, reconstructing ceramic works from the Iberian settlement of Gebut.

During the Spanish Civil War Borràs was conservator at the Museum of the People, where he restored numerous sculptures. After the war he became conservator at the Provincial Museum of Antiques. © IEI Audiovisual Services

Anecdotally, was it necessary for the bishop to intervene at any point when you were identifying the pieces kept in the former St Mary’s Hospital?

When I went to the former hospital to draw up the inventory, I inquired about the Àger chess set, and I was told that they didn’t know where the chess pieces were. Yet I knew that director Sr Alfons Tarragó had them hidden away because I had a spy on the inside, Ramon Borràs Vilaplana, who was in charge of the Museum of the People. So I told the then bishop Juan Villar i Sanz, who sent a letter to the director of IEI threatening to excommunicate him unless he returned the Àger chess set. He did so immediately, as the punishment of excommunication was very effective at that time. Later on, they returned a fragment of alabaster on which the Holy Family had been sculpted.

That must have involved an immense exercise in restoration. How did it go?

A few restoration projects were carried out because I was close friends with Joan Ainaud de Lasarte, director of the Museums of Barcelona. One such case is the Sixena chair, that couldn’t even be touched because all that was left of it was a thin layer of wood and the paint. The wood had been eaten by termites and only the outer layer of it remained. We took it to the Museu d’Art de Catalunya wrapped in cotton wool because even to touch it was dangerous.

It stayed in Montjuïc for many years, approximately fourteen in all, because it was so fragile that we didn’t know what to do with it, until one day Ainaud de Lasarte attended an art conference in Moscow and brought back Araldite for wood. This was the first and

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foremost restoration carried out. Many more works were restored after that, on occasion of the exhibitions organised in Barcelona by the bishoprics of Catalonia.

In our turn, the bishopric restored the Berbegal altar frontal. The restoration was carried out by German restoration students recommended to us by their professor. We only paid for their expenses and for the materials, because for the students it was a practical exercise.

One of the challenges that you found most stimulating and also entailed some setbacks was the construction of a new seminary museum, after the destruction of the former museum in 1936. Could you tell us about this adventure?

After the war, the art works had piled up in the seminary and so we moved them to the south wing, which was fitted out as a museum, and therefore opposite where it had been before the war.

Subsequently, vice-chancellor Monsignor Laureano Castán said, ‘Look, do as you please!’, and so I installed the paintings and other works following my own criterion, according to style, which was something

Romanesque altar frontal from Berbegal, on display at the Archaeological Museum of the Conciliar Seminary of Lleida in 1924. The lower area shows significant losses of support. © Salvany Collection. Biblioteca de Catalunya.

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that didn’t cost any money at all. Then came the visits, registered in a visitors’ book that was kept here, in the Museum of Lleida. We had lots of visits.

Once the seminary had been sold to the City Council, we moved all the stone pieces to St Martin’s church, all the altarpieces and other objects to the Episcopal Palace, and took the fragments of the apostles up to the Old Cathedral. Then, with our scant resources, we founded St Martin’s Stone Museum, where we had someone keeping custody of the works and selling the tickets. I was in charge of the project, which I set up with the help of the Monument Brigade at Lleida City Council.

Later on, we organised what we could call a permanent exhibition of our best works in the north wing of the Episcopal Palace, which could also be visited.

After what you’ve just told us and looking back, could we say that the Diocesan and Regional Lleida Museum has fulfilled your expectations? Are you satisfied with this facility?

Very much! That’s why when it opened I said that as everything I had wanted to do had been accomplished, I could now die in peace!

You studied conservation and restoration. What led you to this discipline?

Yes, I studied three courses of the subject in Madrid.

After being ordained a priest, I asked bishop Don Aurelio if I could go to Rome, where there was a School of Archaeology. The bishop said he couldn’t do without me because he had very few chaplains, but later on I

Berbegal altar frontal. The restoration carried out in 1983 consolidated the wooden support and reintegrated the losses . © Museu de Lleida: diocesà i comarcal

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Opening of the Museum of Lleida.

30 November 2007. © Monsignor Jesús Tarragona

had occasion to travel to Italy and took advantage of it. That was in 1975. I took the first course at the State Restoration Institute, and the next two at the Church Workshop School in the Archiepiscopal Palace in Madrid’s Plaza de la Paja.

Did you ever work as a restorer?

I only restored art when I was a training student.

It helped me learn about the materials used in the making of art works.

One of the social aspects that has led you to intervene in order to safeguard the artistic heritage of some parishes was the depopulation suffered by certain rural centres in the nineteen sixties. Could you tell us about that?

As the mountain was gradually being depopulated, the bishopric decided to visit each village and, with the help of their priests, revise the works in their possession. I made a number of visits to the mountain region to see what could be saved, because if we left the works there they would have been stolen as there was nobody to watch over them. Many of them are on deposit in this museum, such as an altarpiece from the Assumption of Cóll church, from where I also took a cross. From St Vincent of Adons church we took a tabernacle. We were also able to save a figure of Christ from Perves a few months before the village chapel was ransacked.

It is a well-known fact that the Old Cathedral is one of your passions. You have been actively involved with it as president of the Friends of the Old Cathedral association. Could you tell us about the sort of activities you have organised there?

I was one of the founders of the Friends of the Old Cathedral association, and was also its president for some time. We should remember that the building had no doors, no pavement, and still had an entrance for lorries through the wall of the Assumption chapel. We RESCAT

Monsignor Jesús Tarragona with the image of the Christ from St Fruitós of Perves in the background . © Museu de Lleida: diocesà i comarcal (J. V. Pou)

took the entire collection of works in stone from the former Morera Museum that were stored in the IEI to the Old Cathedral. When the IEI was founded, these works got in Tarragó’s way and so he took them up to the Old Cathedral, where he left them in the sacristy and bricked up the door.

As the whole place had been completely abandoned and there was no guard, when burglars broke in through the window they just picked up whatever took their fancy, such as the cover of the tomb of Armengol IX that is now in The Cloisters in New York.

One day, some time later, a curator from the New York museum came to see me to inquire whether we would like to sell them the box of the tomb. I told them that

Our Lady of the Godchildren from the Old Cathedral, on display in the Provincial Archaeological Museum in 1917.

Today it is an object of worship in St Lawrence’s church. © Salvany Collection.

Biblioteca de Catalunya. Barcelona

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the cover had been stolen and explained how, but he wanted nothing to do with it. We had already found the box, in pieces, so we joined them up.

Another piece stolen was a tombstone with a sculpted fish and a relief from the tombs of the Montcadas, today in Museu Marès [in Barcelona]. So with financial help from the City Council, the Regional Government and a few benefactors, we began by providing doors to replace the bricked-up entrance.

The former wooden door of the Annunciation and that of the main entrance to the Old Cathedral were stored in the Diocesan Museum, while the St Berenguer entrance, used to close off the sacristy, was stored in St Lorenzo’s church. We made a copy of the sacristy door and placed it in position. We commissioned these doors from carpenters, who made exact replicas of the originals. We also provided doors for the Exercise House that contained the rooms of the canons, and for the Alms House. We rebuilt the large windows and closed the small openings, as they were all disjointed.

The design was made by architect Pons Sorolla, and the windows were glazed with white glass.

How were these works financed?

The association travelled first to Madrid to see Franco, and ask him to provide funds for the restoration of the Old Cathedral. Our visit was successful because we were accompanied by our sponsor, the Marquis of Lozoya, former General Director of Artistic Heritage and then Honorary President of Friends of the Old Cathedral. On a second trip we visited King Juan Carlos I, and the marquis came with us once again. A renowned specialist, he had published several books on Spanish art. In his established view, the cloister of the Old Cathedral was the largest in Europe.

So it was up to us to find the money. We paid for the repairs to the doors, windows and other elements with the money obtained from the admission tickets and from the Friends of the Old Cathedral association, and

One of the halls in the Archaeological Museum of the Conciliar Seminary of Lleida in 1924. The photograph shows Our Lady of Saidí, today worshipped at St Lawrence’s church in Lleida. ©Salvany Collection.

Biblioteca de Catalunya. Barcelona.

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Our Lady of the Bruise by Jordi Safont in St Paul’s church, before the Spanish Civil War . © Fundació Institut Amatller d’Art Hispànic.

we also covered the cost of the restorations made in the cloister by Regiones Devastadas.

Do you remember any of the restoration projects?

What about the initiatives to detach and transfer wall paintings? Who were the professionals involved?

Yes, murals were restored by the Gudiols, who were the only professionals who transferred paintings in those days. Ainaud always recommended the Gudiols. Having obtained permission from the authorities, we asked them to remove and transfer all the paintings from the Old Cathedral, except those in the presbytery that were left in situ; architect Pons Sorolla commissioned their restoration to Llibert Anglada. Other murals detached were those from Montcada Chapel and St Thomas’s Chapel, and later on, the Stations of the Cross from St Margarita’s Chapel. Transferred to wooden panels, they were taken to Anglada’s workshop in Barcelona to be restored, and then they were transferred back to the chapels where they had originally been painted.

And the Alms House paintings?

Architect Alejandro Ferrant commissioned the Gudiols to detach the paintings in the Alms House, which were then sent to Barcelona. They remained there for quite a long time, until I myself inquired about them through Ferrant, another architect, who intervened personally in order to get them back. I was afraid that they could end up like the mosaic from the Romeral d’Albesa Roman villa that had been removed for restoration purposes but was never claimed and ended up remaining in Barcelona’s Archaeological Museum. We have a fragment on deposit here in our museum.

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Fragments of Our Lady of the Bruise recovered after having been destroyed in July 1936. IEI Audiovisual Archives. Lleida Regional Government

Does any specific restoration stand out in your memory?

I’ll now tell you about one of the murals in the cloister, Our Lady of Succour. We asked Gudiol to detach the painting, but he wasn’t able to remove it completely.

Something went wrong and the best part of the fresco was left on the wall. Apparently he didn’t clean it thoroughly enough, and left traces of glue. Over time, the painting that had been left on the wall began to deteriorate and when Llibert Anglada came to restore the paintings in the presbytery, I asked him whether those paintings could be restored. He said it would be difficult but that he would do his best. He placed a sack of linen about two inches from the painting, and wet the linen every day to ensure the painting was moistened before ironing it. He was consequently able to save it, so we now have two images of Our Lady of Succour — here in the museum we have the fragment detached by Gudiol, and in the Old Cathedral we have the original.

Besides being devotional objects for worshippers in Lleida, some of the articles you have reinstated are art works of exceptional quality. How did this come about?

Before the war, Our Lady of Saidí was in the seminary museum and Our Lady of the Godchildren that came from the Old Cathedral was in the Provincial Museum of Antiques.

The latter housed many works originally from the Old Cathedral.

St Lawrence’s church was restored in 1939-1940 by Baquerizas, a provisional standard-bearer who was also the representative of the state for the recovery of cultural heritage. The whole seminary museum was in his hands, and so he chose the works he considered most appropriate for St Lawrence’s church. In those days work was being carried out to restore the cathedral that had been burnt during the Spanish Civil War, so this church performed the functions of the cathedral. It was the third time it had done so.

Do you agree that these images in the museum be used in ceremonies of worship?

Yes, totally.

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And in the case of Our Lady of the Bruise?

Before the war, Our Lady of the Bruise was worshipped at St Paul’s church, but during the conflict it was destroyed and reduced to fourteen pieces. Found by the recovery force of the Spanish Republic, the sculpture would eventually be recomposed by Ramon Borràs, who cemented the pieces together as he had done with the figure of the Virgin on the façade of the former St Mary’s Hospital. However, the head of the Infant Jesus was not recovered until a later date, although the details of the recovery were protected under secret of confession. In 1989, Our Lady of the Bruise was restored before it was displayed in the Millennium exhibition held at the Alms House cultural centre in Barcelona. The right hand of the figure was reconstructed by Víctor Pallarés, with the dove of the Virgin and the arm of the Infant Jesus that had been lost during the war.

Over the course of your career as curator at the Diocesan Museum you have seen restoration go from being a simple act of repair of art works to being a specialised profession. What do you think of this evolution?

Yes, the way of working has changed completely.

When we restored Our Lady of the Bruise, the Catalan government sent a letter to me saying that the restoration wasn’t quite right. I replied by saying that restoring a sculpture for a museum was different to restoring a sculpture for religious worship. Our restored figure was intended for display in the cathedral, not a museum, so the fractures could be reconstructed if we had access to photographs of the work before it suffered the damage. Luckily, we had photographs of Our Lady of the Bruise, very good photographs, and we were therefore able to restore all the missing parts.

Today Our Lady of the Bruise is an object of worship in Lleida Cathedral, where it has remained since 1967. From 1947 to 1967 the figure was housed in the cloister of the Old Cathedral, close to the Doorway of the Apostles . © Museu de Lleida: diocesà i comarcal (L. Melgosa)

CONSERVATION AND RESTORATION

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Aleix Barberà and Silvia Marín, conservators and restorers of cultural assets, and Carles Freixes, building engineer

ARCHITECTURAL INTERVENTION

Romanesque cathedral belfry window, St Mary of Solsona SOLSONA CATHEDRAL IS A COMPLEX ARCHITECTURAL ENSEMBLE that dates back to the twelfth century and covers a whole range of architectural styles whose original appearance have undergone a number of changes over the course of time.

The building was erected on the former canonry of St Mary that was not designated as a cathedral until the year 1593. Its origins can be traced back to a primitive Romanesque church consecrated in 1163, some areas of which are still visible, chiefly the apse, a part of the cloister and the belfry. The works of art produced for the church at this time came from several different workshops, including the School of Lleida and the circle of the artist known as Gilabert de Toulouse, said to be the author of the sculpture Our Lady of the Cloister that is venerated in a side chapel.

This is documented by Antoni Llorens Solé in his book La Mare de Déu del Claustre published in 1966.

The bell tower is at the south end of the monument that is now surrounded by several later constructions. Up until the construction of the present walls in 1303, the tower formed a part of the fortress that encircled the canonry of St Mary.

When the walls were erected, the church became a part of the actual defensive structure and, as a result, the part of the village that was left outside the enclosure was abandoned. In the sixteenth century the bell tower, that had remained at a lower level when the Gothic nave was completed, was raised. At this time, in order to stabilise the construction it was decided that the group of large windows would be bricked up, and only those in the bell chamber on the top floor would be left open.

Over the course of its history, the cathedral suffered plundering and destruction on more than one occasion. The greatest devastation was caused by the fire started by Napoleonic troops in 1810. The fire completely destroyed the sculptural decoration of the cloister chapel and caused a section of the central nave to collapse. The belfry also suffered the same misfortune as it acted as a chimney and the whole structure, particularly the sculptural decoration, was affected.

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The bell tower in the early twentieth century, seen from the chambers over the cloister. The windows are still blocked, with the exception of those at the level of the bells. Source: Photograph by Pere Català Roca, inventory number 1776 [www.calaix. gencat.cat]

One of the first photographic images of the belfry window, ca. 1920. The deterioration and loss of material is similar to those we see today. The arches beneath the roof are coated with plasterwork.

Photograph from the Archive of the Diocesan and Regional Museum of Solsona - MDCS16

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Optical and electronic microscope images of the patina on the stone surface, with no interaction between the two layers.

The botryoidal appearance is obvious, as is the presence of micro-fissures in all directions.

Source: Màrius Vendrell and Pilar Giráldez, Catedral de Solsona. Estudi analític de diversos aspectes, 2015

This detail of the central part of the chequered pattern shows the fissures and scaling of the stone. Traces of mortar, probably from a subsequent repair or architectural addition, and a layer of brownish paint are also visible. Photo: Aleix Barberà

This belfry window, profusely decorated with an almost unparalleled composition, has survived from the earliest period of the Romanesque canonry of St Mary. It consists of two semicircular windows framed by an arcade. The arches rest on chequered imposts that in turn are supported by capitals decorated with floral motifs. Its distinguishing feature is the central pilaster that divides the composition in two and separates both windows; the pilaster supports a double arcade with chequered voussoirs that rises like a palm tree. In the spandrel of the arcade we find ashlar decorated with little crosses.

This belfry window was gradually concealed behind other constructions, particularly that of the new chapel of Our Lady of the Cloister (1727) and the Episcopal Palace (1776). Before the renovation of the Diocesan and Regional Museum of Solsona, the window was in a corridor that connected this palace to a gallery in order to enter the cathedral. Despite the fact that in the early

twentieth century it had already drawn the attention of architect Francesc Folguera, who on a visit made between 1915 and 1920 made a drawing of the window, it was practically unknown to the general public, as we learn from Carles Freixes in Itineraris arquitectònics de Solsona (1875-1936).

In 1993, the restoration of the cathedral ensemble began, although the construction of the new Diocesan Museum, located between the Episcopal Palace and the upper cloister, had begun in the eighties. When the bell tower was restored in 1994, the Romanesque window was left untouched and it was not until work began on the roofs, which would last from 1998-2003, that the space was reformed to dignify the ensemble. Since 2015 the window can be accessed from the museum and forms a part of the narrative discourse of the Romanesque. Thanks to its recovery, visitors are able to appreciate one of the most emblematic elements of the former canonry of St Mary.

See Francesc Miralpeix Vilamala, ‘Els Morató i l’art del seu temps al bisbat de Solsona’ in 1714, Museu Diocesà i Comarcal de Solsona, Solsona, 2014, pp. 41–76.

2 This typology is also found in the imposing entrances of the Romanesque chapels of St Dominic and St Mary of Torredenegó (Riner, Solsonès) that could have been influenced by the workshop in the canonry of St Mary of Solsona.

3 Carles Freixes, Itineraris arquitectònics de Solsona (1875-1936), Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, January 18, 2012. http://upcommons.upc.edu/pfc/handle/2099.1/13932 1

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Detail of the geminated windows before the intervention, showing an irregular blackened layer and other layers of surface . Photo: Aleix Barberà

Detail of the upper part of the arcade before the intervention. At the ends of the beams we see two lines of holes.

The central palm leaf and crosses in the spandrel is an attractive decorative motif.

Photo: Aleix Barberà

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State of conservation The study of the state of conservation began with the extraction of samples and the following analysis of the stone, carried out by Patrimoni 2.0 Consultors, S. L. We shall now present the results compiled in the report drawn up by M. Vendrell and P. Giráldez in 2015, ‘Solsona Cathedral. Analytical Study of Several Different Aspects’. According to the authors, the cathedral ensemble was built in local stone, fine-to intermediate-grained clay tile made up of detrital quartz silt, feldspar, metamorphic rock and grains of limestone filled with sparry calcite cement (100-micron crystals) and a micritic calcite matrix (10-micron crystals) and varying amounts of clays (kaolinite and illite).

The colours of the different varieties of this stone range from beige to reddish tones, and even greys when the iron associated with the clays is Fe (II). It is quite likely that the stone matches the outcrops around Solsona, where we find the sarsen stone of the northern perimeter of the Central Catalan Basin. A deep fresh cut reveals that these stones were originally grey, and gradually acquired warmer colours when exposed to the elements as a result of the oxidation of Fe (II) to oxides and hydroxides containing Fe (III), that produces the brown or reddish colour.

The observation of the original surface of some of the stones shows a brown coating. Examined under the microscope, this coating looks like a discontinuous botryoidal patina that is very different in colour to that of the substratum stone. A polished section reveals that its morphology consists of a massive, irregular layer measuring 50-60 microns. As we see, it covers the stone and produces practically no interaction between substratum and patina, as confirmed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), even though we observe fissures in all directions that we believe were caused by the fire that produced profound alterations in both the colour and the morphology of the patina.

From the point of view of its composition, the patina is made up of calcium, silicon, aluminium, magnesium, sodium, potassium, chlorine, phosphorus and iron attributed to calcium with some grains of quartz, clays and a binder, probably a phosphoprotein, although the changes it has undergone make it impossible to solve analytically. Starting from the composition detected, we may assume that we are facing the deliberate application of a patina consisting of calcium and clays (that inevitably incorporate a

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Centre de Restauració de Béns Mobles de Catalunya

Cartografies d’alteracions prèvies a la intervenció de restauració del finestral romànic del campanar de la catedral de Santa Maria de Solsona

DADES TÈCNIQUES Objecte Finestral Ubicació Primer nivell de la cara sud Emplaçament Campanar de la catedral Tècnica escultòrica Talla de pedra Matèria Gres local Tècnica pictòrica Sense policromia Autor Desconegut Època s. XII Estil Romànic Dimensions 753 x 622 cm Població Solsona Comarca Solsonès Propietat Bisbat de Solsona Catalogació BCIN Registre CRBMC 12.382

INTERVENCIÓ Restauradors/es Aleix Barberà Giné Silvia Marín Ortega Supervisió Pere Rovira (CRBMC) Carles Freixes (Bisbat de Solsona) Inici 5 d’octubre de 2015 Final 18 de novembre de 2015

DIBUIX Autor Aleix Barberà Giné Escala 1:25

LLEGENDA Mutilació Clau oxidat Disgregació Atac biològic Morters inadequats Desplacament Detritus Zona enfosquida Descamacions i exfoliació Pèrdua de suport Metxinals Esquerda Fissura Element metàl·lic Restes de guix i morters Pintat

*Nota: S’han exclòs algunes alteracions que gràficament serien molt redudants, com ara la brutícia superficial.

Planimetric drawings of alterations in the section of the large Romanesque windows of the belfry of Solsona Cathedral.

Planimetric drawing: Aleix Barberà

little quartz) and perhaps a protein binder. The iron oxides associated with the clays provide the original colour that was probably less saturated than the present colour, given that the fire oxidised the ferrous hydroxides in the oxide phase (Fe2O3), which is much redder in colour.

Organoleptic examination Much of the visible deterioration of the ensemble was caused by the effects of the weather on its constitutive materials. The main losses had been produced on the support, and there was also superficial regression of most of the ashlar courses and decorative elements.

Chips, cavities, exfoliations, disintegrations RESCAT

and scaling could be appreciated in the stone support. In many cases the deterioration entailed a risk of detachment and loss of material.

Traces of biological activity, perhaps caused by bacteria, were found in the central pilaster at the height where the pavement of a new room was annexed to the bell tower. Other signs of changes caused by biological factors, such as the presence of detritus or insect nests, could also be traced, although these were less serious. Finally, the human factor was another of the aspects that led to the deterioration of the window.

In the first place, we should bear in mind the effect that the cathedral fire produced in 1810 during the Spanish War of Independence, which probably weakened the support. The difference in thermal gradience between the external part of the stone, affected by the flames, and the internal part caused the fracture of the support and generated scaling, micro-fissures, fissures and cracks. This effect was particularly visible in the central area of the crosses and chequered

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Detail of several cleaning tubes with solutions applied with micronised cellulose fibres. The best cleaning system was chosen once the results had been assessed. Photo: Aleix BarberĂ

adhered to the support and affected areas in a delicate state of conservation. A number of patches of cement and other mortars had been used to attempt to conceal repairs and holes in the head beams and to fill most of the open joints.

Thanks to the series of alterations suffered by the Episcopal Palace adjacent to the cathedral, this section of the bell tower was protected inside a corridor. Despite having originated some of the modifications described, this fact probably contributed to its preservation.

pattern, besides the archivolts of the two geminated windows, one of which was almost entirely lost. Furthermore, the artificial patina of the stonework acquired a much redder tone as a great part of its surface was covered by a black layer of soot that was adhered to the support, concealing it.

Last but not least, we could speak of the multiple modifications suffered by the space that can still be read today on the face of the window, particularly the holes of the head beams that mark two different sections of roofs: one level that follows the great arcade, and another totally horizontal level above the arcade. Moreover, the side walls of the bell tower were probably also decorated with a chequered pattern, paralleled in the arrangement of the ashlar pieces. Even so, these decorative elements were mutilated and covered by a layer of plaster, as confirmed by the first photographs that exist of the work.

The splatters of plaster on the surface under the main arcade, perhaps produced by the stucco work of the former ceiling, were also found on the window, where they were well www.centrederestauracio.gencat.cat

Process of conservation and restoration Mechanical cleaning The treatment began with a dry mechanical cleaning by vacuum to remove deposits of incoherent dust and inorganic particles, and also biological remains (beehives, feathers, dead insects, etc.). Soft brushes were used in this first superficial cleaning, as the state of conservation of many of the elements made a more intensive overall action impossible. Once the top layer of dust that covered and uniformised the surface had been removed, we had a much clearer view of the actual condition of the window and of the scope of the alterations.

The next step consisted in mechanically removing the cement mortar added to the stonework, in order to avoid both the bad aesthetic impression they made and the possible dislodging of stones produced by different coefficients of contraction and expansion between materials. The dry mechanical cleaning process was completed with the removal of splatters of plaster and other mortars from the surface. In most cases they were removed with scalpels, as besides being strongly adhered to the support, many of these stains were found on sculpted areas such as the capitals and chequered patterns.

Chemical cleaning Once we confirmed that the darkened areas had suffered no disintegration, we decided to subject them to a chemical cleaning process.

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Regional Museum of Solsona that was open to the public. Besides other visitors, it welcomed over three hundred students who followed the process of conservation and restoration thanks to an inspired campaign promoted by the museum, and which made it necessary to prioritise the use of aqueous cleaning systems.

Several tests were carried out to choose the best system, combining different products, concentrations and application methods. The most effective formula proved to be the use of a solution made up of 5% ammonium carbonate and disodium EDTA (1:1) applied with micronised cellulose fibres during two hours. This solution succeeded in completely softening the layer of dirt, which was then brushed and easily cleaned without producing any negative effect on the orangey patina that appeared in perfect state under the dirt.

During the cleaning of the window an inscription unexpectedly came to light beneath the layer of dirt. Following the application of the solution to an area of the surface above the left window, a pencil inscription of the date 1812 or 1819 (the last number is slightly blurred) emerged which had probably been written by a workman who had carried out repairs following the fire produced during the Spanish War of Independence.

Biocide treatment The only area with a biogenic coating that was seemingly inactive was exceptionally treated with biocides. First, a blend of ethanol and deionised water (70:30) was applied with a paintbrush and the surface was brushed clean once it had dried. Then the same blend was applied with a swab and left for twenty-four hours, when it was removed and the surface was again brushed clean. This last layer was removed with a scalpel, as it had become well adhered to the support.

Consolidation of the support The consolidation served a double purpose: on the one hand, to restore the internal strength of the areas of intergranular disintegration, and on the other, to restore the strength of the areas with scaling, exfoliation and fissures.

As we were working inside a museum that received continuous visits, we chose to use a consolidating product that was water-based and therefore non-toxic, Nano Estel, an aqueous colloidal dispersion of nano-sized silica (10 to 20 nm), to test on surfaces of stonework measuring 10 x 10 cm. According to the technical details, if the concentrated product is applied, its dry residue content is 30% and as in the case of ethyl silicate, silica gel begins to be formed after the evaporation of the water three or four days later. Following the specifications of the manufacturer, the product was dissolved in deionised water (30% and 50%) and successively applied by paintbrush until the surface was saturated.

GENERIC CLASSIFICATION: Architectural element | OBJECT: Belfry window | MATERIAL / TECHNIQUE: Stone carving | DATE / PERIOD: Twelfth century | DIMENSIONS: Approx. 7.5 x 6 m | LOCATION: Cathedral of St Mary of Solsona (Solsonès) | CRBMC REGISTRATION No.: 12382 | COORDINATION: Pere Rovira Pons RESTORATION: Aleix Barberà and Silvia Marín | YEAR OF THE RESTORATION: 2015

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Two angles of the large window after its conservation and restoration.

The phases of cleaning and consolidation were the most visible and important part of the project.

Photo: Aleix BarberĂ

In both cases, the consolidating effect was obvious, albeit quite superficial. While no studies yet enable us to determine the penetrating capacity of this product, as it is water-based it is probably lower than that of ethyl silicate. Given that the disintegration of the support had only produced a superficial effect (what we discovered was the loss of superficial particles caused by manual rubbing), the result obtained was quite satisfactory. In the end, in order to avoid the accumulation of residues on the surface, we reduced the concentration of the product.

Once we had restored the intergranular soundness of the support, we used hydraulic mortars to fill the separation and plaques. We combined natural hydraulic lime, NHL 3.3, with micronised pumice (1:1) and added pigment to colour the mass, chamfering the edges and reintegrating the fissures and cracks with natural lime mortar and a mixture of aggregates and pigments (1:3) to achieve a neutral tone that would blend into the colour of the stone. The mortar was finished with a sponge in order to highlight the grain and produce a visual vibration that would harmonise the ensemble.

Treatment of metals In the area of the crosses we came across a wrought-iron nail, a historical record to be preserved in spite of the impossibility of establishing whether or not it dated back to the original construction. The light layer of oxides on the surface was removed using a micro-motor aluminium brush. The metal was stabilised with the application of 3% tannic acid in ethanol, and finally by a 3% protective coat of Paraloid B72 in acetone.

Reintegration The archaeological restoration avoided recreating volumes and focused strictly on the workâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s conservation needs. In this sense, we could say that we have treated an architectural element as if it were a genuine museum piece.

The finish of the joints and of the large areas of lost material followed the same methodology as that of the chamfering of edges and filling of fissures. After carrying out several tests, as mentioned, we chose a mixture of natural hydraulic lime NHL 3.5, aggregates and pigments (1:3) to obtain a tone that would blend into the ensemble.

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CONSERVATION OF POLYCHROME SCULPTURE

Conservation and restoration of Our Lady of Patronage from Cardona WITH THE OBJECT OF FINDING AND SAFE KEEPING OUR LADY OF PATRONAGE SCULPTURE, in October 1936 the Monuments Division of the Artistic, Historical and Scientific Heritage Department of the Catalan Government sent a mission to Cardona, led by Lluis Rubiralta, a cultural activist from Manresa.

There had been no news of this valuable sculpture since the beginning of the Spanish Civil War, and it was considered lost. After overcoming a number of obstacles, Rubiralta and his team gained access to St Michael’s parish church in Cardona, where they discovered that the interior had been burnt, all liturgical objects had been destroyed and Our Lady of Patronage had been reduced to a pile of fragments of blackened stone dumped in a rubbish tip.

The operation, protected by the Catalan government’s decree impounding artistic assets, served to locate and gather the fragments which were taken to the Archaeological Museum in Barcelona. Unfortunately, some parts of the sculpture, including the head of the Infant Jesus, were never recovered.

In 1937 the head of the workshop at the Archaeological Museum, restorer Francesc Font Contel, and his team reconstructed the image from the remaining fragments. In 1940 the figure of the Virgin was returned to Cardona, when the original head of the Christ Child, found by an inhabitant of the town during the war, was restored to its rightful position.

Origin and description According to tradition, the Count of Cardona took the figure to Cardona in 1423. He had obtained it as a war trophy after having sacked the city of Marseille. Judging by the style and the high quality of the sculpture, Dr Francesca Espanyol attributes it to one of the artists in the Rieux workshop.

The name Rieux refers to a group of artists, today still anonymous, who in the fourteenth century produced the sculpture for the funerary chapel at Notre-Dame de Rieux, a work promoted RESCAT

The sculpture Our Lady of Patronage after its restoration

Ramon Solé, conservator and restorer of cultural assets

Our Lady of Patronage before it was restored in 2015.

Photo: Ramon Solé

Our Lady of Patronage in its niche, 1928 Photo: Local Heritage Service, Regional Government of Barcelona

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Our Lady of Patronage before 1936. Photo: Municipal Historical Archive of Cardona

by the powerful Bishop of Rieux, Jean Tissandier, and located in the Cordeliers Convent in Toulouse.

Charlotte Riou, conservator at Toulouse’s Musée des Agustins, has recently related the sculpture to a figure of the Virgin Mary kept in the aforesaid museum and originally from the Notre-Dame-deBonne-Nouvelle chapel in Saint-Sernin Basilica.

The sculpture represents the Virgin Mary standing, her hair covered by a veil but wearing no sculpted circlet. Nevertheless, the sculptor left a cavity in the upper part of the head so that the figure could be adorned with a tiara or a crown made of precious metals. Holding the child in her left arm, in her right hand she has an open book where we read the first words of The Magnificat (The Canticle of the Blessed Virgin). The contact between the two figures, with the child holding the mother’s thumb in one hand and resting the other on her breast, expresses great tenderness.

GENERIC CLASSIFICATION: Polychrome sculpture | OBJECT: Stone carving | MATERIAL / TECHNIQUE: Dolomitic calcareous stone, fine grain, beige in colour, carved and polychromed (oil and gilding) TITLE /THEME: Our Lady of Patronage | ARTIST: Attributed to Rieux’s workshop | DATE / PERIOD: Fourteenth century | DIMENSIONS: 145 x 55 x 42 cm | LOCATION: St Michael’s and St Vincent’s Parish Church, Cardona | PROVENANCE: Cardona (Bages) | CRBMC REGISTRATION No.: 12.374 | COORDINATION: Pere Rovira | RESTORATION: Rosaura Janó and Ramon Solé | YEAR OF THE RESTORATION: 2015

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Photograph taken during the reconstruction of the figure of the Virgin in 1937, showing the condition of the sculpture as a result of the fire of 1936. Photo: Patrocini Picas Collection. Municipal Historical Archive of Cardona

State of conservation After the Spanish Civil War, both the passage of time and the traces of devotion would leave their mark on the sculpture. Its general yellowing hampered our appreciation of later polychromy, and the deeper areas of the sculptural volumes contained deposits of soot and remains of wax. Furthermore, the right hand of the Virgin was fractured at the wrist, which was held in position thanks to an internal rod. The wrist had been the object of an earlier heavy-handed restoration attempt that consisted in the application of a vinyl adhesive, the sealing of the fissures with industrial putty and subsequent retouching in oil.

Once these modifications were assessed, we deemed it necessary to take the image to the Centre for the Restoration of Movable Property of Catalonia (CRBMC, for its initials in Catalan), where it would be examined and the conservation and restoration could begin.

Techniques of scientific study and diagnosis The sculpture was X-rayed and photographed by ultraviolet (UV) and infrared (IR) light.

The study included the extraction of representative samples of the stone support and the polychromy, which were analysed by stereoscopic microscopy, optical microscopy (OM), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), gas chromatography mass spectroRESCAT

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Detail of the hand with the book, before the restoration. It was broken at the wrist, an area that had been fractured and repaired on several occasions.

Photo: Ramon Solé

Removal of the broken pieces from the right hand of the figure. The bronze rod used as structural support.

Photo: Ramon Solé

metry (GC/MS) and scanning electron microscopy with energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (SEM-EDX).

The X-ray of the sculpture certified that a large number of metal rods were used in the reconstruction of the figure. The dismantling of the right hand revealed the use of a bronze rod as an internal support, which leads us to think that the other rods we see in the X-ray are of the same material. The study of the photographic material of the figure, spanning the years 1918 to 1938, enabled us to trace its traumatic recent history and identify the larger original fragments that had been preserved. All the sculptural pieces that had been lost were reconstructed in plaster, and the small original pieces preserved were then added.

Unfortunately, the difficulties entailed in X-raying a sculpture of this thickness made it impossible to obtain a clear image that would allow us to distinguish between original and reconstructed materials. Nonetheless, an estimated 38% of the sculpture is thought to be a plaster reconstruction.

As regards the stone support, a sample was extracted from an appendage to the shoulder of the Infant Jesus, and its study corroborated what had already been confirmed during the organoleptic examination, that the figure hadn’t been sculpted in alabaster but in dolomitic calcareous stone of fine grain and beige in colour.

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Presentation of the various broken pieces, once the plaster that had been used to join them in a previous intervention had been removed.

Photo: Ramon Solé

At present, we are still analysing the stone support of the Virgin that should enable us to identify the provenance of the material. This study is carried out in collaboration with the Interdisciplinary Centre for the Conservation and Restoration of Heritage (CICRP, for its initials in French) in Marseille. Once completed, the information obtained will help determine how much of the original carving had been preserved and thus establish or not its Marseillais origin.

In turn, the information obtained from the analysis of samples of polychromy have revealed that the oldest remains preserved of the sculpture were polychromed in oil with traditional pigments such as white lead, cinnabar, azurite blue and carbon black. The surface was burnished, especially in the flesh tones, as a result of which the marks of the brushstrokes had practically disappeared. Gold leaf was also used in the gilding of the hair of the Virgin and Child, and silver leaf was applied to the decoration of the edging of the cloak of the Virgin.

The same pictorial technique was used to apply polychromy to the parts reconstructed in plaster in the restoration carried out in 1937, although modern pigments such as artificial ultramarine blue and barium yellow were also introduced.

Copper was identified on the mordant gilding, applied to a synthetic adhesive coating.

Visual recreation revealing the internal metal supports used during the reconstruction of the figure. Image obtained thanks to the X-rays of the sculpture. Photo: Jaime Salgueiro

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Rosaura JanĂł and Ramon SolĂŠ, restorers of the sculpture, during the restoration work.

Detail of the head and of the upper part of the body of the Virgin before the restoration, seen under ultraviolet light. The sandarac resin reacts to the radiations and emits visible light of a greenish shade.

The FTIR and GC/MS analyses confirmed that the figure had been coated with a layer of sandarac varnish, slightly darkened with carbon black, presumably in order to provide a lustrous finish and give the reconstructed sculpture the appearance of age. Sandarac resin was commonly used in the preparation of varnishes for different purposes and was described in numerous manuals and instruction books published in the first half of the twentieth century. Given that sandarac gum was considered a low-quality resin and was therefore seldom employed in restoration work, its use in Our Lady of Patronage is explained by the fact that the sculpture was treated during the Spanish Civil War, a time of material shortages.

Conservation and restoration treatment The conservation and restoration treatment consisted chiefly in cleaning the sculpture in order to remove surface layers that darkened it and hindered the appreciation of the poychrome decoration.

The aging of the sandarac resin had produced the yellowing of the layer of varnish, giving it a certain degree of opacity. It was therefore necessary to remove these superficial layers without damaging the underlying polychromy, both the early layers and those of 1937. The first step was to carry out a cleaning test survey, www.centrederestauracio.gencat.cat

Detail of the upper part of the sculpture halfway through the cleaning process. Along with the removal of some of the repainted areas, the cleaning enabled the recovery of the original colour of the carnations.

following the CRBMC protocol, in order to design a specific operation for the work in question.

In the first place, the cleaning consisted of removing the deposits of dust from the surface of the sculpture with a soft brush and a vacuum cleaner, and removing the remains of wax with a scalpel. The next step was a process of chemical cleaning with a buffer to remove the soot and smoke adhered to the surface by means of cotton swabs soaked in a pH 5.3 buffer solution. The last step consisted in removing the sandarac varnish and some areas repainted in poor quality oil paint with an ethyl-lactate Klucel G gel, a mixture that allowed for more superficial work without this affecting the underlying layers.

The product was then removed with swabs soaked in isooctane. The cleaning process brought the earliest polychrome decoration of the figure to light.

As regards the support, only the right hand had to be restored. Once dismantled, the traces of white glue used in an earlier reparation were removed before the fragments were joined with epoxy resin. The fracture joints were then sealed with putty and subsequently retouched with Winsor & Newton watercolours.

To conclude, given that the figure of the Virgin is displayed for popular veneration in the parish church at Cardona, a final protective layer of acrylic resin was applied to its surface.

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Centre de Restauració de Béns Mobles de Catalunya

INTERVENTION IN ARCHITECTURAL HERITAGE

Decoration of the Romanesque chapel at Castellterçol Castle THIS ESSAY HOPES TO PROVIDE A GENERAL IDEA of the structural architectural project carried out in the chapel of St Michael of Castellterçol Castle, and of the conservation and restoration of the exterior plaster of the building, specifically those of the western wall (main façade) and the northern wall. This patrimonial ensemble has been declared a Cultural Asset of National Interest.

Description of the structural work The shrine of St Michael of Castellterçol is a small chapel located at the foot of Castellterçol Castle. The nave is barrel vaulted and has a semicircular apse covered by a semi-dome. The door in the façade has a semicircular voussoired arch and a gabled roof, crowned on the western façade by a bell-cote. A rectangular construction with a one-pitch roof was added to the southern façade; used as a sacristy, it provided access to a small choir.

The interior is completely polychrome, the side walls are decorated with imitation ashlar, while the decoration of the vault is late Baroque. The presbytery contains a altarpiece with panel paintings that forms an ensemble with the altar.

According to historian and priest Antoni Pladevall, in the early twelfth century it was built

by Tedmar Mir de Castellterçol; in the eighteenth century, a sacristy was added to the main building, and in the late nineteenth century it was dedicated to Our Lady of Remedy. It also underwent a number of interior and exterior alterations.

The initial project of architectural restoration commissioned by the Josep M. Anzizu Foundation intended to correct the structural deficiencies revealed by the interior and exterior cracks in the side walls, in the centre of the main façade, in the semicircular arch of the vault and in the basket-handle arch of the choir.

These alterations prompted the restoration the roof and the stucco on the three façades, and the idea of restoring the small splayed window of the apse.

During the reparation of the cracks in the northern façade another door appeared, situated at an intermediate level between the ground floor and the choir, with three or four steps embedded RESCAT

Main façade and north façade of the chapel before the restoration. Photo: Josep M. Esquius

Interior altarpiece.

Photo: Josep M. Esquius

Roger Xarrié, conservator and restorer of cultural assets Josep M. Esquius, architect, description of structural work

Traces of stucco representing pinnacles on the main façade.

Photo: Josep M. Esquius

Crack in the main façade and traces of stucco work.

Photo: Josep M. Esquius

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Crack in the north façade, at the juncture of apse and nave. Photo: Josep M. Esquius

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in the wall. This led us to think that there had previously been a northern entrance to the present choir, as a result of which we changed the initial project in order to make this former entrance visible albeit without recovering the whole entrance.

The reinforcement of the vault of the choir revealed the existence of a former southern door, of the same size as the present door, that was probably bricked up when the entrance was moved to the main façade in the eighteenth century. As we learn from the adjoining commemorative plaque, the space of the former door was used as a tomb for a provost.

The human remains it contained were left in place, and the finishes restored the decorative elements of the earlier door.

The repair of the vault of the roof exposed its extrados, which was insulated before the former tiles were replaced. The vault was reinforced by lime mortar. During the course of this work on the roof we found several slabs scattered around the recess of the vault that could have been the remains of an earlier slabbed roof. We recovered these slabs and placed them all together, protecting them with a geotextile fabric before completing the work on the roof.

We asked the Centre for the Restoration of Movable Property of Catalonia (CRBMC, for its initials in Catalan) to examine the area behind the wooden altarpiece to see if the intrados of the apse, that is now bricked in, contained traces of original wall paintings. No traces were found, so the area was left as it was.

The exterior of the chapel contained much of the original plaster of the Baroque period, some areas of which were in a bad state of conservation, and the main façade still presented remains of stucco work imitating sober architectural decoration: a semicircular arch around the perimeter, interspersed with small pinnacles.

View of the slabs of the roof once the tiles had been removed.

Photo: Josep M. Esquius

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Progress of the restoration and findings.

Sketch: Josep M. Esquius

North façade before the restoration, with cracks in the stucco. Sketch: Josep M. Esquius

Section after the restoration.

Sketch: Josep M. Esquius

Following the advice and support of Pere Rovira, expert restorer in charge of the Department of Mural Painting and Stone Sculpture at CRBMC, we agreed upon the need to preserve this original decoration, in spite of its state of conservation and aesthetic limitations, in order to perpetuate the history and style of the building. Along these lines, we also thought it necessary to preserve the stucco work of the northern façade, that bore no decoration.

This specialised work, carried out by restorer Roger Xarrié, completed the intervention on the façades, roof and choir. The restoration of the paintings in the interior of the shrine will be tackled in a subsequent phase.

As mentioned, the walls were painted to imitate ashlars and had a bordered cornice at the beginning of the barrel vault. The top layer of paint of the cornice was Baroque in style and ochre in tone, and here and there were signs of another layer of bluish tones, the full extension

of which is unknown. It would be a good idea to examine these paintings in detail before actually beginning the conservation and restoration. In our opinion, the elements discovered during the restoration work done so far should be emphasised to ensure that a part of its constructional history is visible at first glance, i.e., the outside door in the northern façade, the gauge of the former door in the southern façade, the area of the tomb of the provost, and the configuration of the former stucco work on the main façade.

The conservation and restoration of the chapel’s original exterior stucco work On 20 May 2014 a technical committee led by architect Josep Maria Esquius and Pere Rovira, head of the Department of Mural Painting and Stone Sculpture at CRBMC, met at the shrine of St Michael to try and establish, through several different tests, whether the interior of the chapel

GENERIC CLASSIFICATION: Architectural material | OBJECT: In architectural terms, the structure of the shrine; in terms of conservation and restoration, the mortar of the northern (main) and western façades of the chapel MATERIAL / TECHNIQUE: Stone and plaster wall with lime mortar | DATE / PERIOD: Romanesque in origin. Eighteenth century (exterior) and nineteenth century (interior) | DIMENSIONS: 12 m in length, 5.8 m in width, 5.80 m in height (including the apse of the sacristy, 8 m in width) | LOCATION: Chapel in St Michael of Castellterçol Castle (Moianès) | OWNERSHIP: Josep Maria Anzizu Foundation | CRBMC REGISTRATION No.: 13225 | CATALOGUING: BCIN (665-MH, IPA-28680, BIU 69) | COORDINATION: Pere Rovira | RESTORATION: Structure: Josep M. Esquius; decoration: Roger Xarrié YEARS OF THE RESTORATION: 2014-2016

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PRESENT STATE

PROJECT

Findings The former access to the choir appeared during the strengthening of the façade

FINAL PROPOSAL

1. Stucco 2. Ashlar

RESTORATION OF ST MICHAEL’S CHAPEL

EVOLUTION DURING THE BUILDING WORK

Possible constructional evolution.

Sketch: Josep M. Esquius

Ground plan

Elevation Elevation

Main elevation

Section

STAGE 1

Ground plan

Elevation

Main elevation

Section

STAGE 2

STAGE 3 Ground plan

Elevation

RESTORATION OF ST MICHAEL’S CHAPEL

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Main elevation

Section

BEFORE THE BUILDING WORK

HYPOTHETICAL EVOLUTION OF THE CONSTRUCTION

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required by restoration charts. The northern wall received the same treatment and all its original stucco has been preserved.

Once the added strata were mechanically removed, a first layer of lime mortar in a 1:4 proportion was applied to all the areas of ashlar to level off the surface of the façade. The original stucco work that had been darkened by the marks produced by biological agents was then treated with biocides.

Once the mortar used to prepare the wall was dry, it was applied to the original shapes. There were two kinds of layers of lime mortar: the first one more or less rugged, and the second one refined, according to whether they were used as decorative mortar or masonry. The oculus of the façade, which had lost its initial shape, was also volumetrically reconstructed in order to emphasise its original circumference.

The conservation and restoration of the chapel is a fine example of collaboration between architect and restorer designed to preserve the historical contents of the building, to highlight its architectural reading in perfect combination with its aesthetic decoration and, ultimately, to enable it to preserve its function.

General view of the chapel after the restoration, showing the two façades.

Photo: Josep M. Esquius

General view of the chapel from the apse, untouched during the restoration. Photo: Josep M. Esquius

contained more valuable paintings than those observed at first glance, and whether there were any traces of earlier stucco work beneath the visible upper layer of the northern wall and those of the main façade.

Other tests carried out subsequently revealed a type of lime stucco on the right and left margins of the façade, and a 40 cm frieze that frames the two sides of the roof resembling a serrated coping. Two reproductions of pinnacles in lime plaster could be made out in the central area. In all, six tests were carried out in this area. The northern wall was subjected to two tests to determine whether it concealed plasterwork, and to check the width and depth of the cracks that we thought lay beneath.

As agreed, the principles of the restoration were to preserve the strata of lime stucco, to remove the later additions and harmonise the façade by highlighting the original frame, as RESCAT

View of the main façade after the restoration.

Photo: Josep M. Esquius

CONSERVATION AND RESTORATION

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Ramon Solé, conservator and restorer of cultural assets

RESTORATION OF STONE SCULPTURE

Restoration of the arches in the cloister at the Monastery of St Mary of Bellpuig de les Avellanes AFTER SIX MONTHS OF WORK, on 15 October 2016 the conservation and restoration of the arched structures in the cloister of the monastery of St Mary of Bellpuig de les Avellanes was completed. The conservation work forms a part of the overall restoration of the cloister, promoted and co-financed by the Institute of Marist Brothers of the Province of the Hermitage, and the Spanish Ministry of Public Works (that contributed 1.5% from its cultural funds).

The executive architect and director was JoanAlbert Adell, and the firm that won the bid for the work was RèCOP Restauracions Arquitectòniques, SLU. The restoration was supervised and coordinated by the Centre for the Restoration of Movable Property of Catalonia (CRBMC, for its initials in Catalan).

Preliminary work The conservation and restoration work of the colonnade and arches of the cloister derived from the results obtained from preliminary studies based on the analysis of the materials, the prospecting tests carried out on the walls, organoleptic analyses and the mapping of alterations of the ensemble.

The studies were made in situ, in a work setting defined as a practicum. In this context, intern students from the Higher School of Conservation and Restoration of Cultural Assets of Catalonia (ESCRBCC, for its initials in Catalan), under the technical and scientific supervision of CRBMC, worked on the preventive conservation and restoration, and mapped the various pathologies of the cloister. This practicum was carried out in the months of June 2014 and May 2015.

Professionals from other disciplines such as geology, chemistry, archaeology, history and art history also took part in the study of the cloister, and this interdisciplinarity allowed us to further our knowledge of the materials used in its construction, its historical evolution and its state of conservation. This contribution of knowledge www.centrederestauracio.gencat.cat

Image of the cloister before the restoration.

Photo: © Archive of the Monastery of St Mary of Bellpuig de les Avellanes (Robert Porta)

One of the spandrels in the east gallery revealing a fine layer of Portland cement and a coarse repair made of black plaster on top of the red plaster used in the reconstruction of the arch.

Photo: Rosaura Janó

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Diagram of the building materials used in the construction of the north gallery. Arches made of units of prefabricated Portland cement were incorporated during the restoration and refurbishment of the monastery carried out by the Marist Brothers in the nineteen twenties.

Diagram and photo: Jaime Salguero and Ramon SolĂŠ

enabled us to implement the basic executive project for the restoration of the cloister drawn up

by Joan-Albert Adell.

The Cloister. History and construction materials The cloister of St Mary of Bellpuig has a rectangular ground plan, and its typology is that of Catalan Romanesque cloisters. Around the courtyard, the four galleries are supported by semi-circular arches braced by coupled columns that alternate with pillars and engaged columns.

Columns and pillars rest on a continuous stone bench. The overall style is Romanesque, with diamond-pointed decoration on the imposts and corbels. This uniformity, however, is interrupted in the capitals: those of the southern and western galleries are decorated, while those of the northern and eastern galleries are plain.

The cloister is the only architectural space of the monastery that has survived in its entirety, at least in stylistic terms. Since its construction in the thirteenth century, the cloister has undergone successive restorations and reconstructions to remedy the deterioration suffered whenever it was affected by a war or a riot. The War of the Spanish Succession, for instance, proved particularly destructive, as did the apathy and neglect shown towards the monastery since it was confiscated in the nineteenth century, not to mention some of the unfortunate decisions made in the twentieth century.

Each restoration process has left its mark, both in the constructional solution and in the RESCAT

materials employed, which are different to those initially used and are designed to preserve the original Romanesque style. This explains why little remains of the cloister described by Don Diego de Monfar i Sors in the mid-seventeenth century, who spoke of a huge fountain and declared that the walls contained numerous stone tombs of cavaliers and noble vassals of the Counts of Urgell.

From this point of view, if we were to divide the cloister diagonally we would see that only the architectural elements in one half (containing the southern and western galleries) are sculpted in stone, which leads us to think that they are original; those in the other half (containing the northern and eastern galleries) are not quite the same. In the northern gallery, the bases, columns, capitals and imposts are made of stone, but the arches and corbels decorated with diamond points are industrially made of Portland cement.

These pieces were added during the restoration and adaptation of the monastery into a seminary for the Marist Brothers in the nineteen twenties.

The bases, columns, capitals and imposts in the eastern gallery are made of stone, but the arches consist of internal structures made of yellow and reddish bricks and lime mortar. The mouldings of the arches and the corbels decorated with diamond points are reproduced in plaster on these structures. This reconstruction was carried out in the eighteenth century.

The range of materials was neutralised by the effect of the coatings applied to give the cloister a chromatic unity. As we learn from documents of

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Diagram of the building materials used in the construction of the east gallery. The range of materials here is much greater than in the other galleries.

The supporting elements were sculpted in stone while the arches were reconstructed in bricks and plaster after the War of the Spanish Succession.

The awning of the external façade was made of prefabricated units of Portland cement in the twentieth century.

Diagram and photo: Jaime Salguero and Ramon Solé

Diagram of the south gallery registering the coating materials and surface layers detected in this area. Diagram and photo: Jaime Salguero and Ramon Solé

GENERIC CLASSIFICATION: Sculpted architectural elements | OBJECT: Arched structures in the cloister of the monastery MATERIAL / TECHNIQUE: Stone carving, plaster, bricks, Portland cement and artificial stone | DATE / PERIOD: Thirteenth to fourteenth centuries | LOCATION: Monastery of St Mary of Bellpuig de les Avellanes, Os de Balaguer (Noguera) CRBMC REGISTRATION No.: 12.276 | CATALOGUING: BCIN | COORDINATION: Pere Rovira | RESTORATION: Ramon Solé (director of the restoration); Rosaura Janó, Gemma Piqué and Jaime Salguero (restoration). Roser Bonfill, Raúl Gámiz, Gemma Illamola, Guillem Massalles, Mònica Rueda, Jaime Salguero and Clara Solano (trainee restorers) YEARS OF THE RESTORATION: 2014, 2015 (practicum: June 2014 and May 2015) and 2016

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Diagram of the alterations in the support of the north gallery.

Diagram and photo: Jaime Salguero and Ramon Solé

Diagram of the alterations in the support of the south gallery. Diagram and photo: Jaime Salguero and Ramon Solé

the period, in 1790 the cloister was limewashed in order to conceal the repairs and reconstructions carried out in plaster. The traces of whitening that have survived reveal that it had been applied to the whole structure, including the sculptural architectural elements forming the cloister.

Nevertheless, both in the original areas and in RESCAT

those that had been rebuilt, black paint was used to cover the structural joints. From the twentieth century onwards, the white tone of the limewash would be preserved, although at some point over the years a beige/ochre colour closer to the tonality of the stone of the monastery was introduced.

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Diagram of the consolidation work of the stone support carried out in the east gallery. Diagram and photo: Jaime Salguero and Ramon SolĂŠ

Section of the east gallery showing the arches reconstructed with local bricks and plaster. Photo: Jaime Salguero

Detail of the consolidation of the stone support with the injection of ethyl silicate in the small fissures. Photo: Guillem Massalles

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State of conservation. Causes of the deterioration The hand of man, that had originally created the monasteryâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s cloister, was also chiefly responsible for its alteration and deterioration.

For the most part, the stone employed in the construction of the cloister is a local sarsen stone that has a matrix of plaster and clay. A dry environment protected from water and dampness is ideal for the conservation of this stone, which is easily altered in contact with moisture. Furthermore, the deterioration of the stone began just after the modification or suppression of the old roofs and eaves due to the effects of wars, repairs and the construction of rooms above the cloister, so contact with dampness and water has a great deal to do with its alteration and deterioration. Yet the water and dampness do not only come from rainfall and winter mists, but also from the continuous watering of the grass in the garden of the cloister, which over the past thirty years has accelerated the process of deterioration of the stone. So, the interaction of water, dampness and the different materials employed in the construction and repair of the cloister has caused the alteration of the stone, given that some of its materials, such as plaster and Portland cement, contain salts.

Process of conservation and restoration One of the main objects of the intervention, besides that of consolidating and cleaning the stone of the cloister, is saving the collection of building materials used in its various RESCAT

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Detail of the laser cleaning tests carried out on a capital.

Photo: Jaime Salguero

Laser cleaning of the voussoirs of an arch.

Photo: Rosaura Janó

Cleaning of an impost by means of a controlled microprojection.

Photo: Jaime Salguero

reconstructions, which we consider to be a part of its history. For this reason we have reduced as much as possible the effects of water and dampness on the cloister’s architectural elements, including the reconstructions, in order to avoid further deterioration. Once the restoration is completed, this will ensure a certain degree of stability and harmony between the different materials, favoured by the building of an overhanging perimetric structure in the form of eaves to protect the sculptural elements from rainwater, and that of a perimetric drainage system in the garden (contemplated in the basic executive restoration project drawn up by JoanAlbert Adell).

Another aspect worth mentioning of the conservation-restoration is that of the cleaning process. The 2014 and 2015 practicums included cleaning tests to choose the most appropriate system that would be applied during the restoration works of 2016. The stratigraphic study carried out on samples taken from representative spots in the arches of the cloister revealed that we would not find any traces of mediaeval polychromy as most of the upper layers of paint were either modern or contemporary.

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These studies were made in different areas of the south-eastern pillar of the cloister, and the chemical cleaning methods explored included aqueous cleaning tests by means of different buffer solutions, tests with ionexchange resins such as Amberlite ANAR6744 OH, and tests with Arbocel BC200 powdered cellulose poultices soaked in an aqueous solution of ammonium carbonate and ethylendiamine-tetraacetic acid bi-sodium salt (EDTA) in varying proportions. These cleaning tests were combined with micro-sandblasting of aluminium silicate and pumice stone.

Finally, the south-eastern pillar was subjected to physical cleaning by means of photonic desincrustration by means of a laser beam designed for use in restoration work, the CTS Art Laser.

Once the cleaning tests were completed, the results led us to conclude that, in view of the

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Cleaning of the stone column with gauzes.

Photo: Rosaura Janó

Detail of a capital before and after the cleaning process.

Photos: Jaime Salguero

Before and after the conservation and restoration of the artificial stone sculpture representing St Marcel·lí Champagnat, founder of the Marist Brothers. Created by the sculptor and image-maker Carles Flotats i Galtés, it has stood in the centre of the cloister since 1947. Photos: Jaime Salguero

amount of encrusted dirt and the blackening of the stone, we would proceed by cleaning the stone with a laser system and then carry out a chemical cleaning by applying poultices of ammonium carbonate and EDTA in order to eliminate the traces of whitening. The last phase would consist of the micro-sandblasting of aluminium silicate to remove calcareous concretions that had not been eliminated by other methods.

The cleaning process notably improved the overall appearance of the various architectural and sculptural elements forming the arches in the cloister, enabling us to recover the legibility of the relief decoration on the Romanesque capitals that had been concealed by layers of lime and dirt.

This improvement, along with the removal of the layers of large-grain plaster that had covered the walls of the cloister since the nineteen eighties, and the treatment of these areas with lime mortar, enabled the recovery of the original Romanesque style that had been preserved in the cloister of the monastery with more or less difficulty.

View of the cloister after the intervention, showing the entablature that protects the arches and the perimeter drainage in the garden. Photo: Jaime Salguero

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CONSERVATION AND RESTORATION

INTERVENTION IN CRAFTED SILVERWORK

Conservation and restoration of pieces of orfèvrerie from the Diocesan Museum in Urgell to update its museographic discourse LOCATED ON THE SAME PREMISES as the city’s cathedral, the Diocesan Museum in Urgell was founded in the twentieth century on the initiative of a group of citizens who in 1957 asked the local bishop if they could exhibit a set of liturgical and religious objects. As a result, and thanks also to the setting up of the Diocesan Committee for Artistic Heritage, the collection grew considerably.

Today, the Diocesan Museum in Urgell possesses one of the most important collections of religious art in Catalonia, comprising frescoes, panel painting, sculpture, fabrics, clothing, crafted silverwork, documents and a range of liturgical objects. In 2015 the museography began to be updated and a new discourse was prepared for the cathedral ensemble.

One of the first tasks carried out by the Diocesan Museum was the restoration of the Pietà altarpiece located in the presbytery of the church of the Pietà.

Coinciding with this work and with the grant received in 2016, a proposal was made to restore a series of liturgical pieces that accompanied the altarpiece and endorsed the new museological discourse, along with other pieces that despite not belonging in the chapel also required the intervention of a restorer. In all, thirty-one pieces of orfèvrerie were restored (see the complete list).

State of conservation The series of works is quite diverse and comprises several different materials. Their state of conservation ranged from regular to good, and they presented the same kind of alterations — a darkened and tarnished appearance produced by the sulphuration of the silver, that also affected the tonality of the gilding.

The surfaces had lost their shine and showed signs of abrasion, scratches and even losses of metal, many of which had been repaired by soldering. Over time and due to oxidation, the excess of added metal turned black and altered the morphology of the pieces.

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Cathedral navicula.

Seventeenth-eighteenth centuries. Silver sulphide gives it this blackened, tarnished look. Small spots of chloride have produced changes in the metal.

Chalice. Nineteenth century. Silver oxide on the gold plating.

Episcopal candlestick with finial snuffer.

Seventeenth-eighteenth centuries. Silver-alloy oxidation and soldered repairs with cracks.

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Carolina Jorcano and M. Nieves Marí, conservators and restorers of archaeological material

DESCRIPTION OF THE OBJECTS TREATED Processional cross with the Pietà motif (MDU 489) - CRBMC 13022 Ciborium by Ramon Grau (MDU 124) - CRBMC 13023 Reliquary of the Arcavell corporals (MDU 123) - CRBMC 13024 Chrismatories or vases for holy oils (MDU 78/79/80) - CRBMC 13026 Cruet and episcopal tray (MDU 128/129) - CRBMC 13027 Galceran de Vilanova custodial holder (MDU 127) - CRBMC 13028 Three sacra from the cathedral (MDU 130) - CRBMC 13029 Cathedral incensory (MDU 532) - CRBMC 13030 Vessel belonging to Bishop Simeó de Guinda (MDU 125) - CRBMC 13031 Reliquary of the Santa Espina (MDU 115) - CRBMC 13032 Reliquary of St Francis of Sales (MDU 243) - CRBMC 13033 Ciborium from Sanaüja (MDU 422) - CRBMC 13034 Pax with the Pietà motif (MDU 507) - CRBMC 13035 Cathedral navicula (MDU 541) - CRBMC 13036 Chrismal (MDU 593) - CRBMC 13037 Chrismal (MDU 611) - CRBMC 13038 True cross (MDU 119) - CRBMC 13039 Cruets and tray (MDU 250) - CRBMC 13040 Sculpture of St Ot (MDU 77) - CRBMC 13041 Aspergillum of St Balaguer (MDU 699) - CRBMC 13042 Aspergillum of St Balaguer (MDU 700) - CRBMC 13043 Episcopal candlestick with finial snuffer (MDU 291) - CRBMC 13044 Resuscitated Christ (MDU 126) - CRBMC 13045 Chalice, eighteenth century (MDU 116) - CRBMC 13046 Chalice, nineteenth century (MDU 117) - CRBMC 13047 Chalice, eighteenth century (MDU 118) - CRBMC 13048 Chalice, eighteenth century (MDU 121) - CRBMC 13049 Ciborium (MDU 431) - CRBMC 13050 Four candelabra from the cathedral (MDU 262 - 265) - CRBMC 13051 Ostensory belonging to Bishop Benlloch (MDU 318) - CRBMC 13052 Chalice, nineteenth century - CRBMC 13072

Ciborium by Ramon Grau. Fourteenthfifteenth centuries. Superficial dirt has accumulated on the base. Photo: Carolina Jorcano and Nieves Marín

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As concerns repairs, we discovered that many iron nails had been used to replace the missing silver nails because they are cheaper although less stable. We also found pieces that were incomplete and others, like the bishop’s ostensory, that had lost their original plinth.

As is often the case with such objects, the pieces were covered in a layer of soot, wax and dirt, in this case produced by the atmosphere surrounding them, the smoke and wax of the candles used in such liturgical spaces. As a result precisely of their use, over the course of time many of the pieces had been inadequately adjusted or else had suffered breakages, fissures or deformations, as observed in the cross with the Pietà motif or the sculpture of St Ot. Furthermore, less accessible areas often contained traces of calcium carbonate cleaning products in calcium carbonate form that, along with the humidity, had accelerated the corrosion.

Scientific and technical studies Once the organoleptic inspection had been performed, the pieces were subjected to various analyses including stereomicroscopy (using a Nikon SMZ 800 magnifying glass) and Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy or FTIR (with a Perkin Elmer Spotlight 300) to discern their constituent materials, establish their state of conservation and decide the means to be used in the intervention.

No elementary analyses of the silver were performed for the restoration of the pieces of orfèvrerie, although their surfaces were subjected to stereomicroscopic tests before and after the intervention, which enabled us to detect a number of changes such as micro-fissures, abrasions, scratches and the wear of the gilding.

Ciborium by Ramon Grau. Fourteenth-fifteenth centuries. One of the two hinges joining the cover and the metal cup has broken. Superficial dirt has accumulated on the metal support.

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Episcopal candlestick with snuffer.

Seventeentheighteenth centuries.

Manual and mechanical cleaning of the surface with a swab dampened in ethanol. Photo: Carolina Jorcano and Nieves Marín

Ostensory belonging to Bishop Benlloch. Seventeenthnineteenth centuries. The piece has been dismantled in order to be able to clean each of its components and gain access to its inner areas.

Photo: Carolina Jorcano and Nieves Marín

Restoration process Given that the treatment varied according to each material, the first step was to divide the works into groups: those made of silver, those made of silver with gilding, enamelled pieces and polychrome pieces. The works containing wood were subjected to anoxia to ensure that they were free of all xylophagous insects.

To begin with, whenever possible we disassembled the pieces in order to work more comfortably and reach the less accessible areas more easily.

We then proceeded to carry out a physicalmechanical cleaning to remove the superficial dirt and the remains of calcium carbonate of earlier products using thin flat brushes, soft brushes and ethanol. The remains of soldering and points of corrosion were then removed with the help of a scalpel.

Once this first process was completed, if the pieces still presented layers of persistent or deeply embedded grime, they were subjected to a chemical bath. Silver and silver gilded pieces were immersed in this bath, although not those with enamel or polychromy, as these materials are susceptible to alteration. The softened dirt was easier to remove with a soft brush. Whenever possible, once the pieces had been brushed they were introduced in an ultrasound tray with distilled water to remove RESCAT

Reliquary of the Arcavell corporals. Sixteenth century. Manual and mechanical wet cleaning of the superficial dirt with an organic solvent. Photo: Carolina Jorcano and Nieves Marín

Cathedral incensory.

Seventeenth-eighteenth centuries. Detail of the ultrasonic apparatus that shows how it removes the traces of dirt and oxidation on the piece, and the residues of products used in the chemical and electrochemical cleaning processes. Photo: Carolina Jorcano and Nieves Marín

Chrismal. Eighteenth century. The piece consists of a silver box with an inner wooden support for the three silver cylinder vessels containing the Holy Oils. Cleaned with a water-based gel given the impossibility of separating the wooden support from the metal.

Photo: Carolina Jorcano and Nieves Marín

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Sculpture of Saint Ot. Seventeenth century. Two appliqué decorative motifs from the plinth of the sculpture. The one on the right has not been cleaned; the one on the left was cleaned with a water-based gel to remove the superficial dirt and the oxidation of the silver.

Ciborium from Sanaüja. Possibly sixteenth century. Chromatic reintegration with mica in powder, in silver and gold tones.

Photo: Carolina Jorcano and Nieves Marín

Reliquary from Santa Espina.

Fifteenth century. Consolidation and reintegration of cracks, fissures and areas with losses by the injection of epoxy resin.

Photo: Carolina Jorcano and Nieves Marín Ciborium by Ramon Grau.

Fourteenth-sixteenth centuries. Before and after the conservation and restoration treatment.

Processional cross with the Pietà motif. Sixteenth century. Before and after the conservation and restoration treatment.

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Aspergillum.

Eighteenth century.

Before and after the conservation and restoration treatment.

Reliquary of the Arcavell corporals.

Sixteenth century.

Before and after the conservation and restoration treatment.

the most embedded particles of dirt along with the remains of previously applied products.

The pieces that had the characteristic black oxidation of silver were subjected to an electrochemical bath to remove the stains with the help of soft brushes, followed by a number of baths in distilled water in the ultrasound tray until all residues of the cleaning products had disappeared.

Once clean, the pieces were moved from the ultrasound tray to the heater in order to remove excess humidity, thereby avoiding the risk of further alterations in contact with the air. When cool, the pieces were sprayed or brushed with a protective layer to prevent further oxidation.

This was the procedure followed in most cases.

The pieces with inner wooden frames that should not be wet and therefore could not be disassembled, RESCAT

Ciborium from Sanaüja. Possibly sixteenth century.

Before and after the conservation and restoration treatment.

Cruets and tray.

Seventeentheighteenth centuries.

Before and after the conservation and restoration treatment.

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Chalice. Eighteenth century. Before and after the conservation and restoration treatment.

Chalice. Nineteenth century. Before and after the conservation and restoration treatment.

Sculpture of Saint Ot. Seventeenth century.

Before and after the conservation and restoration treatment.

those painted in polychromy, and those decorated with enamel that had already suffered some deterioration, however, were cleaned with chelating agents and tensio-active agents using gentle mechanical means. Once the pH of these pieces and their conductivity had been identified, a specific gel was prepared for their controlled cleaning. The gel was applied to the metal and to the polychrome paint and left for a while for the cleaning to be complete, then rinsed off, eliminating surface dirt.

Both cleaning systems removed the silver chlorides and sulphides from the pieces, which recovered their initial bright silver appearance, respecting their original patina that helps highlight the chiaroscuro of the chasing and engraving.

After the cleaning process the pieces with deformations were mechanically adjusted, thus improving their appearance and stability. The broken pieces were consolidated and restored with epoxy resin suitable for metal, and then chromatically reintegrated with mica powder in shades of silver and gold. The polychrome areas were protected with resin of low molecular weight and the gaps were chromatically reintegrated with acrylic paint. In their turn, the pieces of wood were mechanically cleaned before the application of a protective layer.

The pieces made of glass were cleaned and consolidated, and epoxy resin was used for their volumetric reintegration. The last step, once the protective layer had been applied, was mounting the pieces, replacing the iron nails with silver nails and providing new chains and rings, easily distinguishable, to complete the ensemble without creating a false historic appearance.

GENERIC CLASSIFICATION: orfèvrerie | MATERIAL / TECHNIQUE: silver and gilt silver. Wooden frames and copper structures.

Occasionally glass, fabric, velvet, natural sponge, semi-precious stones and enamel | DESCRIPTION: pieces of liturgical orfèvrerie DATE / PERIOD: from the fifteenth to the nineteenth centuries DIMENSIONS: different sizes | LOCATION: Diocesan Museum in Urgell, Seu d’Urgell (Alt Urgell) | CRBMC REGISTRATION NO.: 13022 to 13052 and 13072 | COORDINATION: M. Àngels Jorba | RESTORATION: Montserrat Cañís (processional cross with the Pietà motif), Carolina Jorcano and M. Nieves Marí | PHOTOGRAPHS: Ramón Maroto and Jennifer Sánchez | ANALYSIS: Ruth Sadurní and Ricardo Suárez PH ANALYSIS AND CLEANING ADVICE: Clara Bailach | ANOXIA: Pep Paret | LOGISTICS: Carmelo Ortega | REPLACEMENT OF PIECES: Montserrat Cañís and Laguarda Joiers

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INNOVATION AND RESEARCH

The Restoration of Traditional Buildings in Japan Minimum intervention is the basic principle in restoration. The same principle is followed in Japan, although other factors that should be taken into account include the climate and the specific natural phenomena of the area. Besides receiving twice as much rainfall as Spain, the country is prone to typhoons and earthquakes.

Traditional buildings in Japan are made of timber, clay and plaster — fragile materials considering that they have to suffer the effects of water and adverse natural phenomena. In order to prevent rainwater from damaging buildings, we need to guarantee the proper state of conservation of the roofs. In fact, the frequency of the restorations will depend on the material used in making the roofs and their condition.

As we see in the photos, typhoons and earthquakes are very destructive to buildings. In Japan, architectural restoration is designed bearing in mind the structural equilibrium, the appearance, the value and characteristics of buildings. Broadly speaking, the lifespan of tile roofs is approximately eighty years; in the case of metal roofs it is approximately fifty years, while in that of thatched roofs it is roughly thirty. Buildings undergo a complete restoration every eighty to one hundred years. Metal and thatched roofs have to be

replaced completely; in the case of tile roofs, the pieces that can still be used are relocated, which is why some buildings have tiles that date back over a thousand years.

Restoration Before restoration begins on a building, its various elements are measured: the length of the timber pieces and of the tiles, the thickness of the walls and of the different layers of plaster, etc., and a 1:1 scale drawing is made in situ on the ground.

This process enables us to calculate the height of the reference line and see which parts have moved and which areas have remained the same, for instance. The drawing is very important in the restoration project.

No metal nails are used in Japanese timber-framed buildings, and no industrial or chemical products are used either to reinforce them when they are in the process of restoration. As regards replacement work, timber pieces are not generally changed in their entirety.

Instead, the healthy timber is preserved, following the umeki and tsugiki techniques. The umeki method

Effects of an earthquake in Japan.

Photo: www.thm.pref.miyagi.jp/fukkou/tenyuji.html

Consequences of a typhoon in Japan. Photo: www. miyakomainichi.com/2013/09/54273/%EF%BC%91%EF% BC%93%E6%97%A5%E4%BB%98%EF%BC%91%E9%9D %A2%E7%94%A8%EF%BC%92/

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Makoto Isawa, architect and restorer of traditional wooden Japanese buildings

Syachi: a joint used in the tsugiki technique.

Photo: Makoto Isawa

resembles the treatment for tooth cavities: the damaged area is removed and the gap is reintegrated with wood, while tsugki consists in preserving most of the wood by joining it with the new pieces. In both cases the carpenters use the same type of wood, choosing parts that bear the greatest resemblance and placing the new shingles in the same growth direction of the old ones. This procedure is necessary because the behaviour of old wood and new wood is different; new wood expands and shrinks, even if it has previously dried. In order to minimise the difference between tensions and unequal movements between pieces, the wood has to be â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;readâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; correctly.

When working with umeki and tsugiki techniques, the new areas must be larger than the old ones, given that during the drying process they will shrink and a few years later the new pieces will be the same size as the old wood.

This difference in size is of 1 Bu (3.03 mm), which is a very important measurement. When the tiles or metal roof are put in place, an air chamber of 1 Bu is left between them in order to prevent water entering by capillarity.

Ideally, the air chamber should be of 1.5 Bu (4.545 mm), although in practice, for aesthetic reasons, it is only of 1 Bu. Very often, when a tiled roof and its structural timber elements are restored, fissures or cracks appear in the walls of the building, which should also be restored.

Japanese walls are made up of two layers of clay, as a base, and two layers of plaster as a finish.

Not all types of daub can be reused in the restoration of walls, because the coefficient of thermal expansion of clay and plaster differ, and the resistance of walls is reduced if too much old clay is reused. If the clay is mixed with plaster, the increase in volume of the latter is much greater when it comes into contact with water, which would produce cracks in the wall. www.centrederestauracio.gencat.cat/

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New daub must be soaked in water with reeds for approximately two years before it is prepared for use in construction. Under such conditions of humidity, biological elements act as an adhesive. If the new daub is mixed with old daub from a previous building, these elements grow more quickly and the construction clay can be prepared in just one year. If more than 50% of the old daub is mixed with the new, the resistance is reduced, yet even in this case it has been proved that this kind of clay is appropriate for use as restoration material. In the restoration of walls, old daub is habitually used for approximately 50% of the work.

Still from a video showing the making of a Japanese bell tower. Design of the maquette and video: Makoto Isawa

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Centre de Restauració de Béns Mobles de Catalunya

NEWS

Refresher Course on the Criteria for Interventions and Preventive Conservation of Photographic Collections ORGANISED BY: the Centre for the Restoration of Movable Property of Catalonia (CRBMC) on 28, 29 and 30 September and 5, 6 and 7 October 2016

Rosina Herrera viewing deteriorated images.

Photo: Carme Balliu

Luís Pavão during a practical session.

Photo: Carme Balliu

In the framework of the National Photography Plan, and in keeping with the conservation and restoration projects that the CRBMC is carrying out in its Department of Documents, Prints and Photographs, last September and October it organised the Refresher Course on the Criteria for Interventions and Preventive Conservation of Photographic Collections. The course was a starting point for the unification and presentation of criteria governing interventions in our photographic heritage.

The course was international in nature and counted on the participation of contemporary masters in the handling of photographic images.

With Luís Pavão we learnt how to work on glass plate negatives, Rossina Herrera taught us how to identify photographs, Ángela Gallego showed us different forms of presentation and other identification techniques, and with Pep Parer we explored different photographic supports and types.

Carme Balliu, conservator-restorer of archive graphic material

An exercise with corner reinforcement pieces carried out during the session dedicated to forms of presenting photographs by Ángela Gallego Photo: Carme Balliu

Forthcoming Training: The Centre for the Restoration of Movable Property of Catalonia is working on the organisation of the following courses: Oriental Techniques Applied to the Dimensional Stability of Paper and Parchment. Luis Crespo Arcà Theoretical and Practical Course for the Identification of Historical Plastics. Silvia García Fernández-Villa and Ruth Chércoles Asensio. Déco Furniture and its Restoration. Mónica Piera and Joan Güell More information: www.centrederestauracio.gencat.cat

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A BOOK TO READ

El yeso. Su elaboración y empleo en la pintura y dorado de retablos

Sonia Santos Gómez. El Ejido: Círculo rojo, 2015, 328 pages.

A key part of the work carried out by restorers involves an in-depth knowledge of artistic materials, obtained from the study of documentary sources and from direct examination, which is why we need referential tools. This comprehensive study of gypsum is therefore a good professional guide.

For those interested in traditional sources, the first part of the book contains a precise and thorough compilation of essays, treatises and recipes from antiquity to the twentieth century that describe the manufacture of gypsum, underlining the difference between gesso grosso and gesso sottile, and how it is applied to altarpieces as an undercoat for the polychromy and/or the gilding.

The author, tenured professor at Madrid’s Universidad Complutense, has compiled over fifteen years of research, to which the extensive bibliography bears witness, complemented by a laboratory study of calcium sulphate preparations in the second part of the book.

The comparisons between samples taken from altarpieces of the Spanish School produced between the fifteenth and seventeenth centuries, samples of gypsum prepared in the laboratory by the author herself following historical treatises, and samples of gypsum currently found on the market and commercialised as ‘gilder’s gypsum’, are extremely interesting.

A complete morphological and analytical study is made using optical microscopy (OM) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) techniques, Energy-Dispersive X-Ray Microanalysis (EDXMA), Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) and X-Ray Diffraction (XRD), the results of which are explained in simple terms to ensure they are clearly understood even by those who are not used to interpreting such images.

Besides the obvious benefit of having information on the number of strata, the morphology and the nature of the majority and minority components of these samples, the analyses highlight the difficulties faced by restorers to purchase high-purity materials. Indeed, neither the composition nor the morphology of the commercial gypsum analysed matched those found in real works or those produced in the laboratory. Thus, in the last chapter the author suggests we make our own dead gypsum, and offers a step-by-step description of the simple procedure.

In short, this is a thorough and rigorous study that offers different perspectives of the subject and will no doubt become a work of reference for scholars.

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Criterios y teorías de la conservación y la restauración del patrimonio artístico a lo largo de la historia Miquel Mirambell Madrid: JAS Arqueología, SLU, 2016, 200 pages.

This book is the starting point of a new series of publications on conservation and restoration, coordinated

by Sandra Val and Silvia Marín, entitled ‘Cuadernos de Conservación y Restauración’.

The book is not intended as a brief history of the conservation and restoration of artistic heritage, but as a compendium of the main criteria and theories concerning heritage over the course of history.

It provides essential knowledge on the different restoration techniques applied to artistic heritage in each historic period, explaining the reasons for each procedure and describing who performed them. The author hopes that this knowledge may become a tool for comparing criteria and theories, enabling readers to appreciate those that are still valid today and those that have now become obsolete.

More than a compendium of regulations on the conservation and restoration of artistic heritage, yet neither a manual of all that which has taken place in its field of study throughout history, nor a survey of the evolution of the profession of conservator-restorer, the book is a source of basic information on some of these aspects.

Painstakingly detailed, it is addressed to lay readers.

Sandra Val i Silvia Marín Conservators and restorers of cultural assets and coordinators of the series

Núria Jutglar Restorer of cultural assets www.centrederestauracio.gencat.cat

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CENTRE DE RESTAURACIÓ DE BÉNS MOBLES DE CATALUNYA (CRBMC) C. Arnau Cadell, 30 - 08197 Valldoreix Tel. 935 902 970 - Fax 935 902 971 crbmc.cultura@gencat.cat www.centrederestauracio.gencat.cat www.facebook.com/RestauraCat

PUBLISHER Departament de Cultura de la Generalitat de Catalunya EDITOR Àngels Solé EDITORIAL BOARD Esther Gual, M. Àngels Jorba, Josep Paret, Àngels Planell,

Pere Rovira, Mònica Salas, Àngels Solé and Maite Toneu GENERAL COORDINATION Àngels Planell TRANSLATION Josephine Watson PROOFREADING Àngels Planell, Maria Ferreiro, Josephine Watson

and Aleix Barberà TEXTS© The authors PHOTOGRAPHS Ramon Maroto (CRBMC) and the photographers DOCUMENTATION

Maria Ferreiro, Àngels Planell and Mònica Salas LABORATORY OF PHYSICAL-CHEMICAL ANALYSIS AND EXAMINATION PHOTOGRAPHS Ricardo Suárez X-RAY LABORATORY Esther Gual GRAPHIC DESIGN ciklic. www.ciklic.com COVER Detail of the upper part of Our Lady of Patronage sculpture from Cardona

halfway through the cleaning process. Photo: © CRBMC LEGAL NUMBER B-13.856-2012 ISSN NUMBER (ELECTRONIC PUBLICATION) 2013-3251

Key title: Rescat (Barcelona, Internet) Abridged title: Rescat (Barc., Internet)