13-TA-2018_Turin, Galleria Sabauda, Madonna della Tent, inv. 271

Facilitated description:

 

Madonna of the Tent is a painting on wooden board made in 1514-1516. 
The painting represents Mary with baby Jesus in her kiss and the little St. John on the right. 
Mary is standing in front of a green tent. 
The painting is kept at the Galleria Sabauda in Turin. 
In the past it was thought that Raphael had made the painting.
The La Venaria Reale Conservation and Restoration Centre restored the painting in 2015. 
The restorers studied the old restorations done on the painting and the history of the painting. 
They saw that restorers Giuseppe Molteni restored the painting in 1827.
Scientists at the Venaria Center did scientific analysis to see the drawing that is under the painting. 
Thanks to the analysis, scientists and restorers have seen that the painting is very similar to Raphael's painting kept in the Munich picture gallery.
The restorers eliminated the yellowed paint and some of the paintings from the old restorations. 
They filled the colorless parts with putty (plaster and glue layer). 
In the end they painted the stucco.

 

 

 

 

Abstract of the intervention: 

 

Restoration

The intervention on Madonna of the Tent It was an opportunity to study the complex stratification of previous restoration interventions and the conservative history of a work originally attributed to Raphael. The identification of the individual interventions has been reconstructed thanks to the intersection of scientific data and historical sources, which attest to an illustrious restoration by Giuseppe Molteni (1827). The restoration was accompanied by a diagnostic campaign, which, thanks to infrared reflectography, made it possible to study the underlying design and relate it to that of the panel of the same subject, considered to be the original version of Raphael and preserved at the Alte Pinakothek in Munich.

The restoration began with the selective removal of the overlaid paint layers. In this way numerous repaintings and disomogenities have emerged against the pictorial film and the support. Some retouching was then removed, preserving the oldest colored shots in the gapy and abraded areas. Subsequently, targeted consolidations were carried out with grouting of the gaps and superficial damage (Virgin's chin, Child's eye, St. John's cheek). In agreement with the Royal Museums it was decided to maintain the reintegrative interventions when functional to the readability of the work. After the restoration the painting was exhibited at the exhibition In the footsteps of Raphael in the Savoy collections (Savoy Gallery - Royal Museums, 30 October 2020 - 14 March 2021).

 

Bibliography

- S. De Blasi, Raphael at the lens of the nineteenth century: Interpretation and Restoration, in In the footsteps of Raphael in the Savoy collections, edited by A. Bava, S. Villano, Editris, Turin, 2021, pp. 49-57;
- P. Manchinu, T. Cavaleri, B. Ventura, The restoration of Our Lady of the Tent: notes on the technique of execution and on the conservative history, edited by A. Bava, S. Villano, Editris, Turin, 2021, pp. 59-69;