History of Restoration of Ancient Stone Sculptures History of Restoration of Ancient Stone Sculptures Papers Delivered at a Symposium Organized by the Departments of Antiquities and Antiquities Conservation of the J. Paul Getty Museum and Held at the Museum 25-27 October 2001 Edited by Janet Burnett Grossman, Jerry Podany, and Marion True The J. Paul Getty Museum Los Angeles © 1003 J. Paul Getty Trust Getty Publications 12.00 Getty Center Drive, Suite 500 Los Angeles, California 90049-1682 www.getty.edu Christopher Hudson, Publisher Mark Greenberg, Editor in Chief Catherine Chambers, Manuscript Editor Benedicte Gilman, Editorial Coordinator Vickie Sawyer Karten, Designer Stacy Miyagawa, Production Coordinator Typography by G & S Typesetters Inc., Austin, Texas Printed by Transcontinental, Canada Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data History of restoration of ancient stone sculptures / edited by Janet Burnett Grossman, Jerry Podany, and Marion True. p. cm. "Papers delivered at a symposium organized by the departments of Antiquities and Antiquities Conservation of the J. Paul Getty Museum and held at the Museum, 15-17 October 1001." Includes index. ISBN 0-89136-713-7 (pbk.) i. Sculpture—Conservation and restoration—History—Congresses. i. Stone carving—Conservation and restoration—History—Congresses. 3. Sculpture, Ancient—Congresses, i. Grossman, Janet Burnett, 1943- n. Podany, Jerry, in. True, Marion, iv. J. Paul Getty Museum. Dept. of Antiquities. v. J. Paul Getty Museum. Dept. of Antiquities Conservation, vi. Title. NBH99.H57 1003 73i'.oi8'8 —den 1003011147 Cover: Detail of Leda and the Swan (see plate i). Frontispiece: Detail of an engraving by Carradori showing restorers of ancient sculptures at work (see figure p. 151). Page viii: Detail of an engraving by Carradori showing restorers of ancient sculptures at work (see figure p. 151). Page xi: Detail of an engraving showing various ways of sawing marble and stone for sculpture and the instruments and devices for such use. From Francesco Carradori, Elementary Instructions for Students of Sculpture, trans. M. K. Auvinen (Los Angeles, 1001), pi. 17. Page 163: Detail of Dionysos (see plate in). Contents ix Preface Marion True i Changing Approaches to Conservation Marion True 13 Lessons from the Past Jerry Podany 25 Restoration and the Antique Model Reciprocities between Figure and Field Seymour Howard 45 Ein Apoxyomenos des 5. Jahrhunderts Uberlegungen zu einer von Cavaceppi ergdnzten Statue in Los Angeles Sascha Kansteiner 61 From the Need for Completion to the Cult of the Fragment How Tastes, Scholarship, and Museum Curators' Choices Changed Our View of Ancient Sculpture Orietta Rossi Pinelli 75 The Creative Reuse of Antiquity Peter Rockwell 87 Restoration and Display of Classical Sculpture in English Country Houses A Case of Dependence Jane Fejfer 105 The Role of the Collector Henry Blundell of Ince Edmund Southworth 115 Piecing as Paragone Carlo Alb acini's Diana at Ince Elizabeth Bartman 127 The Investigation of Two Male Sculptures from the Ince Blundell Collection Samantha Sportun 137 Vincenzo Pacetti and Luciano Bonaparte The Restorer and His Patron Nancy H. Ramage 149 "Secure for Eternity" Assembly Techniques for Large Statuary in the Sixteenth to Nineteenth Century Brigitte Bourgeois 163 Plates 179 Reconstructive Restorations of Roman Sculptures Three Case Studies Giovanna Martellotti 191 Restoration Techniques and Sources for the Statues of the Giustiniani Collection Angela Gallottini 2oy De-restoring and Re-restoring Fifty Years of Restoration Work in the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek Mette Moltesen 225 Possessions of Princes The Ludovisi Collection Miranda Marvin 239 The Ancient Sculptures in the Rotunda of the Altes Museum, Berlin Their Appreciation, Presentation, and Restoration from 1830 to 2000 Andreas Scholl 249 Restoring Restored Sculptures The Statues of Zeus and Asklepios in the Rotunda of the Altes Museum, Berlin Wolfgang Maftmann 255 Early Restorations of Ancient Sculptures in the Casa de Pilatos, Seville Sources and Evidence Markus Trunk 265 Themes, Approaches, Issues, and Questions Charles Rhyne 271 Index ix Preface The idea for a conference on re-restoration of ancient sculptures arose in discussions with Brigitte Bourgeois and Mette Moltesen during a meeting in Thessalonike in the spring of 2,000. Talking together about current projects in our various collections, we real- ized that conservators and curators internationally were facing many of the same problems when they undertook new treatments of previously restored pieces. More and more, museums were finding it necessary to re-conserve old collection pieces as the early adhe- sives failed and old fills and joins deteriorated and became unsightly with age. The lack of systematic documentation for reference of the various techniques used by the earlier restorers had become clear to all, and conservators had established neither guidelines nor any universally accepted approaches to the preservation of the telling details and information they uncovered in the process of disassem- bling the work of previous generations of artisans. At the same time as the conservators were coping with the problems presented by the actual objects, scholars sifting through archival materials in libraries across Europe and the United States were discovering previously unmined sources of information about the early sculptors, restorers, and stonemasons who actually did the work. Shopping lists of materials, records of payment, and letters of instruction provided many new insights into the practical aspects of the busi- ness of restoration. What, if anything, could be said about the differences between restorations done in Italy—the source of most of the ob- jects in question— and those undertaken in France, Germany, or England in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries? Were there specific techniques or materials that could serve as identifying fingerprints for known restorers? How could this information be preserved in spite of the need for the sculptures to be re-conserved? We could not hope to answer these questions conclusively, but we thought it was time to convene a group of our colleagues to share what information and experience had been gathered in recent research and conservation efforts. The development and coordination of all aspects of this con- ference were primarily the work of Dr. Janet Grossman, Associate x Curator of Antiquities at the Getty Museum and a specialist in ancient sculpture. She has also overseen the delivery of manuscripts and the editing of this volume. Ann Patnaude assisted with the preparation of all invitations, contracts, and events around the meetings. The tragic events of n September 2.001, which occurred shortly after the letters of invitation had been mailed, unfortunately impacted the program, but those who attended were committed to gaining the maximum benefit from the exchange of information. Discussions were so productive that a variety of publications have been planned as a result of the meeting, including focused studies of various restorers and a more detailed analysis of their working techniques. A second conference, held in March 2.003, followed up on more detailed questions relating to the specific problems conser- vators and curators face in restoring sculptures with missing parts. It is our hope that the publication of these proceedings captures something of the spirit of this fruitful meeting. Marion True Curator of Antiquities and Assistant Director for Villa Planning The J. Paul Getty Museum This page intentionally left blank I Changing Approaches to Conservation Marion True The practice of restoration is so out of fashion nowadays that we are liable to dismiss it as a harmful error of the past that has further separated us from the accurate experience of antiquities. That may be true, but it is also the case that we cannot fully understand the status of fragmentary antiquities in the Renaissance if we do not appreciate how changeable these material conditions were. Changes wrought upon sculptural objects represent attempts to fix their shape and identity. — LEONARD BARKAN, Unearthing the Past1 Who among us has not experienced the frustration of being misled in the accurate identification of a work of art by distorting or mis- understood restorations? Sometimes the problem is the result of repairs made or reuse practiced in antiquity. For example, the reclining female figures found in excavations of the temple of Zeus at Olympia appear at first glance to fit very well into the complex iconographic program of the west pediment. Scholars recognized some years ago, however, that three of these images and one arm of the fourth did not belong to the original composition, being differ- ent in both material and style from the rest of the sculptures.2 Although definitely ancient, the pieces are made of Pentelic marble instead of the fine Parian stone used for the rest of the pedimental figures, and they differ in the style of execution of many details. They were most likely made during later restoration campaigns, the first (including so-called figure A and the arm of figure v) probably undertaken in the fourth century B.C., and the second (including figures B and u) in the first century B.C., perhaps to replace earlier versions of the same types of figures or to replace different images that may have been damaged or destroyed in an earthquake.3 The well-known portrait found at Pergamon and now in Berlin, and identified variously as Attalos I or Eumenes n, repre- sents a different kind of ancient intervention.4 At first glance, its 2 True most remarkable feature appears to be the luxuriously carved hair, but a closer look reveals this to be a stone wig that was clearly created after the original portrait head was finished. Whether a modification made by the original sculptor to add a diadem to a formerly unwreathed head or an alteration made by a different artist to justify changing the identity of the person portrayed, the carefully worked hairpiece remains uniquely successful among the ancient efforts to rework a piece for a different purpose.