نطق چهارم

listen to part of a lecture in an art history class.

ok.Now, unfortunately, works of art don’t last forever. The question is, what do we do about that? I mean, when you’re going to restore art, well, there’s a question isn’t there? On the one hand, we want to repair the work. we want to replace a sculptures missing arm, for example, or or make the colours of a painting that’s faded and changed over time. We want to put it back like it was. we want to restore it, make it whole again, perhaps even improve it. but on the other hand, we want to preserve the authentic remains.

We don’t want to change it. We want it pure true. and and the history of restoration practices reflects this struggle. during the european renaissance, the 16th and 17th centuries, the Discovery of antiquities, ancient works of art was at an all time high, and so was restoration. but even then there was this debate on the one hand, and this is the school of thought that’s perhaps best represented by the Italian sculptor benvenuto chile. Ni anyway. For chile, neither goal was repair and not only repair chile. Ni and others considered it their artistic prerogative to use ancient material as both a model of inspiration and as a source of raw material. many they took a lot of fragments and combine them into Complete sculptures. but but how did they know what the Complete sculpture looked like?

If all they had was a fragment? well, that’s just it. They didn’t. and it didn’t matter. they just create parts as they saw fit. sometimes they’d combine fragments, put together an arm from here, a leg from there. there you mean from different sculptures. oh, sometimes even from different time periods. take, for example, the so called bateman statue of mercury. the bateman statue of mercury at the los angeles county museum of art is just such a pastiche. the head isn’t from the same sculptures. The body and the legs as well as the base were made by the restore. But. that’s that’s hardly restoration. That’s just well creation. I guess they’re just making their own sculpture out of recycled parts. well, but what’s wrong with that? I mean, why not reuse the broken bits? well, isn’t it a bit of a lie? I mean, especially if they present the restored work as the original as restored art, rather than created art, it’s a matter of what’s authentic and what’s not. and don’t you think it’s a little disrespectful to use famous bits as raw material?

you know. I remember charlie knee being quoted as saying, quote, the excellence of this great artist calls me to serve him, end quote. and then he proceeded to serve him by creating from just a torso a whole brand new sculpture. of course, the main the major criticism of that kind of restoration is that it imposes the contemporary aesthetic on the original work. the person doing the so called restoration is no doubt influenced by the fashions and tastes of the day. remember, they often thought of themselves as improving the work. now, on the other hand, in contrast to chile, ni were michelangelo and company, those who thought the goal was simply preservation. michelangelo believed ancient fragments should be left alone, preserved as is. if it’s just a torso, leave it as just the torso as the original work. his view, some say, shows a far greater respect for the original art. yeah, well, charlie probably thought he was helping the original artist by completing perhaps even improving the original. perhaps era.

this is more like it now. Ok, ok. now, later, though, in the 18th century were talking a couple of centuries after the renaissance. restores who worked in the chilean immoderate were criticized in just the ways you’ve suggested. they were accused of disregarding the value of ancient material and of self aggrandizement, of using restorations to advance their own careers. and so restores started to incorporate attention to historical accuracy into their efforts. the field of restoration started to become more of a science than an art, though of course, art was still central, but those who engaged in restoration, now we’re not so much artists as they were historians. that shift may be one of the most important moments defining the development of restoration. the gold changed from artistic invention to authenticity, from restoration to preservation. Michael angelo would have been happy with that shift. yes, I think he would have.