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lifestyle WEDNESDAY, JUNE 10, 2015 Features CSI Rembrandt: Museum sleuths show painting is a Rembrandt fter a CSI-style investigation and restoration ers now you can actually see the original paint again helped us to determine that the painting is in fact spanning eight years, the Mauritshuis museum and then there’s no doubt.” made up of 15 different pieces of canvas; three main Ain The Hague has declared that one of its star Now newly re-attributed to Rembrandt, the parts - the Saul, the David, and an insert of a copy of paintings really is by Dutch master Rembrandt van painstakingly restored canvas is the centerpiece of an an old painting in the upper right corner plus strips all Rijn. The announcement should end years of is-it-or- exhibition opening tomorrow and running through around the edges. So it’s a real patchwork,” she said. It isn’t-it debate about whether “Saul and David” was a Sept 13 that goes into forensic detail on how the remains unclear why the painting was carved up in real Rembrandt. Researchers used advanced X-ray museum unraveled the mystery of who painted “Saul the past. techniques to peer through several coats of paint that and David.” Part of the team that confirmed the attri- One result is that the painting now hanging in had been applied during previous restorations and bution was renowned Rembrandt expert Ernst van de pride of place in the Mauritshuis exhibition - establish that the original pigments were the same as Wetering. “Rembrandt? The case of Saul and David” - is smaller those Rembrandt used in the 17th century. Paint sam- Like many crime-scene investigations, the than Rembrandt’s original. But, in keeping with the pling showed that the primer used was typical of Mauritshuis probe had to deal with a “victim” that had high-tech nature of the investigation, the museum Rembrandt’s studio in the 1650s and 1660s. suffered much abuse. Cut up, painted over and faded also commissioned a 3D printed version of the paint- For decades, there was no question. A former over time, “Saul and David” even had part of another ing in its original size that visitors can touch to get a director of the museum in The Hague, Abraham painting stuck into its top right-hand corner. “Before true feel for the Dutch master’s brush strokes. Director Bredius, bought the painting more than a century the painting was treated, before it was cleaned, it Gordenker said the museum did not set out to prove ago, but in the late 1960s Rembrandt expert Horst became clear that the painting had been over painted that the painting was indeed a Rembrandt. “In fact, Gerson cast doubt on who actually painted the a number of times, that the painting had discolored, we only came to the conclusion about a month ago,” Biblical scene of King Saul using a curtain to dab a that its original dimensions had been changed in the Gordenker said. “We would have been happy to do tear from his eye while David, kneeling below the past,” said Joris Dik of Delft Technical University, this show and come to the conclusion it wasn’t (a king, plucks the strings of a harp. whose high-tech scans helped establish the painting’s Rembrandt).”— AP authenticity and guide restorers. “It’s been really treat- Unraveled the mystery ed brutally, this painting, in multiple past restoration Restorer Carol Pottasch said it was no surprise that campaigns.” Gerson questioned who painted the oil-on-canvas work, because previous restorations had added so Nature of the investigation much paint. “I guess that was the biggest problem Emilie Gordenker, the director of Mauritshuis, said This photo provided Tuesday, June that he faced. He couldn’t see a painting by the investigation turned up plenty of surprises. 9, 2015 by Mauritshuis shows Rembrandt because there was no painting to see,” she Peering through the paint, experts saw a canvas that Rembrandt’s “Saul and David” after said yesterday. “And now we’ve taken off all these lay- almost resembled a jigsaw puzzle. “The analysis restororation. — AP photos Brief film taken before Earhart’s last flight surfaces t was a clear spring day in 1937 when Amelia Like all things Earhart, it comes with controver- was a photo shoot before that flight because she Earhart, ready to make history by flying around sy. Richard Gillespie, executive director of the left quietly that time. Ithe world, brought her personal photographer International Group For Historic Aircraft Recovery, Earhart and Noonan were about two-thirds to a small Southern California airport to document said the film is obviously authentic, but he through their journey when they left New Guinea the journey’s beginning. Al Bresnik took dozens of believes it was taken in March 1937 and not in on July 2 for Howell Island, a tiny speck of land in still photos, including a few that have likely been May, as Swinford concludes. It was in March that the Pacific, midway between Australia and Hawaii. seen by millions. His brother John, who tagged Earhart made her first attempt to become the first In one of her last radio transmissions, the pilot said along, made a very dark, grainy 3.5-minute home woman to circle Earth when she left from she thought they were near but couldn’t see the movie almost nobody saw - until now. The film, California. island and were low on fuel. The first woman to fly “Amelia Earhart’s Last Photo Shoot,” is being solo across the Atlantic, Earhart was one of the released this month by The Paragon Photo shoot most recognizable celebrities of her time, and Agency publishing house, along with an 80- She only got as far as Hawaii, where she crashed Westfall acknowledged that plenty of people may page book of the same name that documents a her twin-engine Electra L-10E on takeoff and had have taken her photo during stops on that trip. But journey that ended tragically short of the finish line to have it shipped home for repairs. “You can tell this appears to be the final film heralding her when Earhart’s plane vanished somewhere over from the way the airplane’s configured,” said departure from California on the first leg of what Newzbeat’s host Sharon Bwogi AKA Lady Slyke (left), writer and producter Daniel the Pacific Ocean. Gillespie who has studied Earhart for nearly 30 would be her final flight. “Then she left us forever,” Kisekka aka ‘Survivor’ and rapper Zoe Kabuye aka ‘MC Loy’ posing at the company’s office A downloadable copy of the film is being pro- years. “The airplane as shown in the film is very Westfall said. — AP in Kampala. — AFP photos vided to those who buy the book. Paragon publish- clearly the pre-repaired airplane.” Whatever the er Doug Westfall said he eventually plans to donate date of the photo shoot, Earhart and her navigator, the fragile original given to him by John Bresnik’s Fred Noonan, left what’s now known as Bob Hope son to an archive or museum. The film, taken with a Airport in Burbank on May 21, 1937, for a second ‘Rap-orters’: Telling the news 16-millimeter camera, sat on a shelf in the office of try, this time heading east. Gillespie doubts there his father for more than 50 years until his death in 1992, said Bresnik’s son, also named John. After in Uganda hip-hop style that, it sat in the younger man’s home in Escondido, California, for about 20 more years. “I ewzbeat” makes a catchy ministers. “People keep asking for more didn’t even know what was on the film until my change from a standard news and asking me questions about certain dad died and I took it home and watched it,” bulletin: Ugandans call the topics,” said Bwogi, 28, who also raps at “N Bresnik said recently. “It just always sat it in a plain broadcasters “rap-orters”, a youth team of venues across Uganda professionally. “I box on a shelf in his office, and on the outside it hip-hop artists-turned-journalists rapping think they love the whole said, ‘Amelia Earhart, Burbank Airport, 1937.’ “ the headlines. “Uganda’s anti-gay law is flavor.”“NewzBeat”, which runs for about making news/Some countries have found it five minutes an episode, usually features Official photos befitting to accuse/Uganda of treating gays about four local, regional and international He can’t say with certainty that his father took as German Jews/Nothing to gain from this stories. Nothing is off limits. The program the film, although he knows his uncle didn’t and more to lose,” rapped the artists in one has “rap-orted” stories on Uganda’s anti- because he’s in it. So is Earhart, looking jaunty recent episode. That song focused on a law pornography laws, the political situation in and more playful than the public persona she signed by President Yoweri Museveni ban- Ukraine and Ebola updates from west sometimes projected. Dressed in a smart ning homosexuality, which drew wide- Africa. pantsuit rather than her standard flight jacket, spread international condemnation. US she shows people around the plane, clambers on Secretary of State John Kerry likened it to Challenging political leaders top to pose for still photos and occasionally grins anti-Semitic legislation in Nazi Germany. Corruption is another favorite topic. “All broadly, something she rarely did in her official In this May 20, 1937 photo, provided by The Amelia Earhart and her Electra plane, taken by “President Museveni says he won’t bow around the world this problem photos.