21mc012-TE-2008_Turin, Galleria Sabauda, G. Dughet, Flock of sheep at the foot of a waterfall, inv. 488, cat. 477

Facilitated description: 

 

Flock of sheep is a painting on canvas.
The painter Gaspard Dughet painted the painting in the mid-1600s. 
The restorers of the La Venaria Reale Conservation and Restoration Centre restored the painting in 2008.
The restorers cleaned the painting from dust with brushes and a small vacuum cleaner. 
They've eliminated the touch-ups and the yellowed paint. 
As they cleaned the painting they discovered another painting underneath what we see.
They painted the parts where color was missing with watercolors and paint.
Eventually they painted the painting to protect it from the sun's rays and dust. 

 

 

 

 

Abstract of the intervention: 

 

Restoration 

The restoration of the work began with a dusting of the verso by means of a soft brush and suction. Subsequently, a revision of the support tension was performed.
The work on the painting was based on a comparison with its pendant ‘Cascata nel campagna romana’ (Waterfall in the Roman countryside), on which work was first carried out given the best state of conservation. The comparison showed a clear gap between the chromatic and chiaroscuro values due to the chromatic alteration of the paint and the retouching on the ‘Gregge di Gore’. Therefore, it was decided to remove the altered substances, superimposed on the original pictorial film, although the latter appeared from the preliminary investigations to be very incomplete. During the cleaning, it emerged that the retouching of the last restoration work compensated for the abrasions of the original pictorial film through which traces of an underlying painting investigated by means of an X-ray surfaced. The most persistent stucco residues were removed with coccocollagen solution. At the end of the cleaning, the surface appeared to be deficient, in particular a large portion of the profile of the hill towards the left half of the painting was missing. The presence of faithful engravings, made by Enrico Gonin in 1835, has provided an important testimony useful to restore the profile of the missing horizon line. The pictorial integration was carried out with watercolour colours. The first painting was done with a brush, then continued with the pictorial integration with paint colors and final spray painting

 

Frame
The frame was first dusted and cleaned with mixtures of ligroin and acetone in various proportions to eliminate the purple touches. The flickering holes of xylophagous insects were treated with repeated injections of permethrin, grouted and chromatically tuned with watercolor colors. 

 

Bibliography 

- S. Villano, Sheet 8.5 in De Van Dyck in Bellotto. Splendeurs à la cour de Savoie, C. E. Spantigati, P. Astrua, A. M. Bava, S. Damiano, Torino, Allemandi, 2009, p. 193.