Ordeals by Titian. The Pushkin Museum restored painting by Titian "Ecce Homo" that is considered lost

Ordeals by Titian. The Pushkin Museum restored painting by Titian "Ecce Homo" that is considered lost
25 July 2016, Monday
The Art Newspaper

Canvas can enter in the main exhibition galleries of old masters, which will open in the former manor-Vyazemskys Dolgorukov in 2018. There may be a number of things, and "displaced values," such as Italian painting XVI-XVIII centuries and sculpture by Donatello, suffered a fire in Berlin in 1945. Restoration of them have already begun.

 

Titian treats one of the scenes of the Passion: "Then Jesus came to the crown of thorns and the purple robe. And Pilate saith unto them, Behold the man "(John 19: 5) - and comes from the famous collection of Venetian patrician Cristoforo Barbarigo. After Titian's death in 1576 he bought from the artist's son his house with all its contents. In 1797 th meeting of the Barbarigo it was purchased for the Hermitage, and in 1924 canvas by Titian, among other works handed over to Moscow.

 

Almost immediately began his ordeal. In April 1927, along with four other things stolen painting. The offender was in a hurry and cut canvas messy - bottom right corner of Titian was in the frame. But I could not sell anything. One work - attributed Pisano Flagellation of Christ - found quickly: it back to the museum the Italian businessman, canvas he was offered for sale. And in 1931, buried in the ground damp iron pot were found rolled in a tube canvases by Rembrandt and Titian. Restorer Vasily Yakovlev (aka the famous Soviet academician, who worked in the manner of the old masters, the winner of two Stalin Prizes) recalled: "I am trying to remove from the tin completely stuck together, slimy and wet pieces of some incredible rags." Rembrandt was in the best condition - it Yakovlev duplicated on the new canvas, and in 1933 the painting was sold abroad. Titian, duplicating, mothballed and left - it seemed forever.

Titian canvas Jupiter and Antiope (1552), also known as Venus Pardo returned to the permanent exhibition of the Louvre, after a long restoration, started in 2002. For a long time it was decorated with a hunting palace of the Spanish kings Pardo near Madrid. Since 1661 painting is kept in the Royal (now the government) collections in France. Thanks to X-ray and infrared analysis of the Center for Research and Restoration of Museums of France (C2RMF) able to identify the layers of tinting and recordings made with the end of the XVII-XX centuries. Various changes are also found, made in the course of work by Titian, because Jupiter and Antiope was created more than 30 years. Initially, it was shown only one naked female figure in a landscape. The clearing was performed from 2010 to 2013. They were removed darkened layers of oxidized varnish and traces's interventions in 1949 and 1993 so that the canvas again became visible houses and other details. In addition, the strengthened areas with cracelures and primed joints where Titian canvas piece down and pulled up a picture on a frame larger.

 

"Today, the ratio of the restoration has changed, - says Nikolay Kolesnikov restorer, engaged in painting, - new opportunities, materials, methods of interfacing ... Some things can be done better and more sensitively with respect to the author's canvas. First of all it is necessary to strengthen the layer of paint, remove the excess soil restoration. " After this restoration Council opened appreciate the author's paintings, and restoration will continue, despite the loss. "It makes no sense to leave now in ruins, - explains the deputy director of the Department of Conservation and Restoration of Hope Pushkin Koshkin. - Painting restore only to the extent of losses. And it will not be re-written picture will Titian Titian. "

 

However, all is not as bad as it seems at first glance. The soil applied in 1930, and covers the dead fragments, and in some places the paint layer. "Usual story - says a leading researcher and curator of Italian painting collection of the Pushkin Museum Victoria Markova. - Rough primer deposited plaster - is a direct indication that a ground has the original painting. It is not clear to what extent. Mothball its not the best, but, thank God, the soil is washed away. Mechanically remove soil scary: Painting in Venetian is more fragile than the Florentines, they had no such system multilayer painting, like, say, Rafael. Although the technique of Titian, his improvisational brushwork involves layering (he wrote "on a wet soggy", immediately making changes), in this picture there is almost no layers. For Titian is not typical, but there are a lot of his things. It is the job 1570s, very late Titian. "

 

Painting has always been known, but its removal from the scientific turnover has generated a lot of rumors. Markov recalls how in 1970 a Western art, confusing provenance, have another canvas by Titian as a picture of the Barbarigo collection. However, there was only one version of the same composition, probably one of the students. Today authorship Titian is not questioned. When complete the restoration, the picture seems to be in the Gallery of Old Masters, opening in 1918. It will be an entirely new exposure, because of the almost 700 works from the collection of Italian art today can be seen only 140. In this list there are things from a "special fund" - the ones that came to the museum after the war. Some of them in 1995 were shown in the exhibition at the Pushkin twice rescued, while three works - Tondo Biagio D'Antonio, a woman with a rose of Paris Bordone and Crucifixion with workshop centurion Veronese - since in the permanent exhibition. Another 122 works from the number of displaced has shown a year ago in the exhibition Italian painting XVI-XVIII centuries, which took a surprisingly quiet. However, the blame for this "stealth" can not be a museum. After all, the catalog of these paintings, created by Victoria Markova in the early 2000s, was published only in 2014. The state does not seek to quickly reveal the secrets.

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