Organisers: Portucalense University


The Portucalense University (UPT) organised last 26 and 27 of November the I Symposium on Conservation-Restoration of Golden Woodcarving and Sculpture (I Simpósio Conservação e Restauro da Talha e Escultura – Preservar o passado, garantir o futuro). The conference took place at the university auditorium in Porto, Portugal.

UPT is a private higher education institution, created in 1986, that offers a Bachelor in Conservation and Restoration within the Education Sciences and Heritage Department. It was through this Bachelor that the symposium was organised.
This event meant to bring together several specialists, both from academy and companies, to discuss the latest technologies, methodologies and interventions on golden woodcarving and sculpture, with an emphasis on recent projects from the north of Portugal. One of the interesting aspects of this symposium is that several students helped to organize it, among which some even presented communications. This is due to the fact that some students are professionals already working in the field, and with many years of experience, with several backgrounds and trainings. The present degree they are now undertaking is an effort to obtain a certified training within the latest education model, the Bologna process.

The morning session was started by Dr. José Tedim, art historian and professor at UPT, with an interesting and personal insight into the several workshops of religious sculptures that existed in Porto during the XIX and early XX centuries. There were several important workshops at that time that created many of the sculptures that are still in churches from Porto and the north region of Portugal. It was explained how these workshops evolved, how the locations of these artistic centres changed in time between the margins of the Douro river and their relationship with other well-known centre of religious imaginary, in Braga. A curious mention was that Dr. Tedim shares several personal memories of this subject, as his family was run one of the major workshops at that time.

Mr. António Pereira, conservator-restorer of sculpture and student at UPT, presented the practical case of wood treatment of the altar and sculpture of the Holy Spirit of Moreira do Lima chapel. The wood was particularly weakened by an attack of wood boring insects. This attack was serious as several structural timbers became instable jeopardising the entire altar. Among other operations, the intervention included the disassembly of the structure and the disinfestations and the stabilisation of the support. Although the ethical criteria were always kept in mind, including that of the minimum intervention, there were some elements that had to be replaced to ensure the structural integrity. At the end, some relevant issues concerning the future maintenance of the altar were discussed.

The afternoon session was started by arch. José Falcão, director of the Department of Historic and Artistic Heritage from the Diocese of Beja, on the inventory project that the diocese undertook. Beja is located in the south of Portugal and it is the religious centre of the region of Alentejo, which is perhaps as large as it is rich in heritage. The size of the region and the elderly population are among the factors that allowed an increase in theft of cultural heritage. In 1985, the Department of Historic and Artistic Heritage was created and with it the mission of making an inventory of religious heritage. This was an important step as it was the first diocese to implement such a project leading the path to all the others. Among other factors, the inventory has allowed to (re)discover works of art, to bring the population closer to their heritage and even to promote conservation and restoration interventions.

The next talk was given by Graça Lobo, conservator and student at UPT, who prepared a communication based on her latest interventions on golden woodcarving. I never stop being surprised by some study cases such as this, where a chapel altar that was disassembled by some mysterious reason was scattered across several houses and barns. The contact with the population in this case was very important as it succeeded to bring many pieces of the altar together, some of which appeared anonymously. Although the altar was in poor conservation state, it was possible to assembly most of it.

The afternoon session continued with an intervention by Fernando Ribeiro, from the Center of Conservation and Restoration in Viseu, who continued the series of communications focused on wooden supports. His intervention was somehow radical as he defended that at the moment there are plenty professionals having a strong theoretical knowledge but lacking a good practical experience that should be given during the university years. Even more, he went further condemning many recently trained professionals to “hide under the principles of conservation, such as the minimum intervention principle, to minimise the lack of their practical knowledge”. This was the source of an interesting but rather short discussion in the debate, as these topics are always difficult to discuss being limited to the speaker’s competences.

After a much needed coffee-break, it was my own turn, as conservator-restorer and professor at UPT, to speak about the use of laser technology for the cleaning of polychromies with a focus on polychromed sculpture and golden woodcarving. I believe that the majority of conservator-restorers are still not familiarised with this technology which is still in research stage for its use in polychromy, and so my intervention started with the explanation of the technique, equipments and the possible practical uses. However, there are many technical and physical problems that prevent lasers from being used for cleaning polychromed sculpture on a standardised basis. Concerning the golden woodcarving, research has shown that laser cleaning is a promising technique although few study cases are available.

The last presentation of the day was given by Micaela Duarte, conservator-restorer and professor at UPT, who introduced the audience to an inventory project that is being performed with the Diocese of Braga and the Museum of Alberto Sampaio, in Guimarães. The undergoing project gathers several teams that catalogue all the works of art from the churches in the diocese of Braga and, whenever possible, prepare a room to serve as archival room of the catalogued pieces. It was interesting to see that some churches rediscovered pieces they didn’t know they have.

The second day of the symposium was started with a presentation of arch. Raquel Oliveira in place of Ernesto Oliveira, professional and student at UPT, who performed an intervention to a series of paintings from a chapel in Vila do Conde. The chapel is somehow special as it is located just near the Atlantic ocean, which favoured a long term exposure to humidity. The intervention was focused on the 40 panel paintings from the ceiling that were separated by gilded frames. Although the treatment of the paintings was without particular interest, the treatment of the wooden support and the reassembly of the paintings and frames became the focus of the intervention, which entailed interesting aspects such as the air circulation near the ceiling due to the proximity of the ocean.

André Varela Remígio, conservator-restorer of sculpture, spoke about the intervention he performed on the reliquaries of the sanctuary of the Monastery of St. Mary of Alcobaça. 48 busts and 10 arms from different saints were treated during this intervention. It should be mentioned that this intervention was published in the issue number 11 of e-conservation.

Adriana Amaral, from the North Regional Delegation of Culture in Porto, presented “Integrated Heritage”. During the communication, numerous examples of built heritage, namely churches, retables and sculptures were shown, including their conservation state before and after the intervention. The danger heritage faces due to lack of maintenance, among others factors, was underlined. Inumerous photos were shown of an incredible poor conservation state demonstrating that, unfortunately, people that are responsible for heritage are not always aware of how (or sadly even why) that same heritage should be conserved.

Dr. Luisa Reis Lima, art historian and professor at UPT, introduced the audience to the study of the golden woodcarving of Braga, which was one of the most prolific centres in the production of altars. The problematic of past ‘renovations’ on golden woodcarving that have altered permanently many of altars with the loss of important artistic, and historic, information was highlighted.

The afternoon session started with the presentation of Dr. João Oliveira, coordinator of Criminal Investigation from the Judiciary Police (PJ), entitled “Criminal Prevention on the Culture Domain: the Judiciary Police Projects”. The investigation of art theft is, under the Portuguese law, responsibility of the PJ. Police have also a museum dedicated to the works of art that were apprehended and could not be returned to their owners, in most of the cases because they were never claimed or they belong to anonymous owners who do not complain about the thefts. Thus, the police have developed some projects focused on preventing thefts rather than just solving them. Two projects were initiated - Igreja Segura (Safe Church) and S.O.S. Azulejo (S.O.S. Tiles) - in collaboration with many partners, as alert and sensitisation campaigns with the objective to promote information and safety measures to protect the cultural heritage.
 
The next two presentations focused on the inventory effort that the Diocese of Porto is developing. For a welcomed change, Manuel Amorim, priest and Director of the Department of Church Cultural Assets from the Diocese of Porto, was the only speaker without a PowerPoint presentation, allowing the audience to focus on his words. His talk focused on the history and the human side of the project. Upon request of the Bishop of Porto, the inventory started in 2006. An incipient effort had been made much earlier although based solely on a volunteer basis and did not achieve results due to the lack of human and economic resources. At the present, the Diocese has 6 technicians that are cataloguing churches from the periphery to the centre of Porto. The second speaker, Dr. José Costa, also from the same Department, presented some of the technical details of this project, such as training actions, multimedia applications and safety among others. 

Dr. Carlos Pombo, specialised photographer of works of art and professor at UPT, made a very interesting presentation concerning the photography of cultural assets and its intricate problems, including aspects like the analog vs. digital preventive measures to have in mind during the photographic session in order to minimise the possible damage to the works of art. As informative as illustrative, it was one of the best presentations from the symposium.

Finally, the last presentation was given by arch. Paula Silva, Director of the Services of Cultural Assets of the North Regional Direction in Porto, who spoke about the intervention case studies on built heritage that were funded within the QREN (National Strategic Reference) framework. From interventions in the historic centre of Porto to complete rehabilitations of monasteries in the north of Portugal, a wide and very complete catalogue of interventions was shown during the presentation in order to illustrate the work performed by the Regional Direction over the past years.

I would like to congratulate the organisers for their initiative. It was a successful one, with over 150 attendees, showing that the public has a real interest on this topic. Also, it is always useful to see diverse reports of interventions on important, or less notorious woks of art and other projects that otherwise would be difficult to know about. During this type of conferences I usually find myself thinking that it would be ideal to find a complementary way to keep track of the professional practice on national level besides conferences, although until then this is really the only way to share information in our field.
 

About the author

 

Rui Bordalo

Rui Bordalo is conservator-restorer specialised in easel paintings and the Editor in Chief of e-conservation magazine. At the moment he teaches at Universidade Portucalente, in Porto. He is also member of  ARP (Associação Profissional de Conservadores-Restauradores de Portugal), and E.C.C.O. (European Confederation of Conservator-Restorers' Organisations) Committee since 2005.

 

Download Issue 12

Download this article

 

Permanent link to this resource: http://www.e-conservationline.com/content/view/847