Name: 【TED】Maurizio Seracini: The secret lives of paintings (Maurizio Seracini: The secret lives of paintings)
Uploaded: 2016-06-06T07:41:16.000Z
Duration: 12 min 35 s
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Translator: Joseph Geni Reviewer: Thu-Huong Ha

In 1975, I met in Florence a professor, Carlo Pedretti,

my former professor of art history, and today

a world-renowned scholar of Leonardo da Vinci.

Well, he asked me if I could find some technological way

to unfold a five-centuries-old mystery related to

the "Battle of Anghiari," which is supposed to be located

in the Hall of the 500 in Palazzo Vecchio, in Florence.

Well, in the mid-'70s, there were not great opportunities

for a bioengineer like me, especially in Italy, and so

I decided, with some researchers from the United States

and the University of Florence, to start probing the murals

decorated by Vasari on the long walls of the Hall of the 500

Unfortunately, at that time we did not know that

that was not exactly where we should be looking,

because we had to go much deeper in, and so the research

came to a halt, and it was only taken up in 2000

thanks to the interest and the enthusiasm of the Guinness family.

Well, this time, we focused on trying to reconstruct

the way the Hall of the 500 was before the remodeling,

and the so-called Sala Grande, which was built in 1494,

and to find out the original doors, windows,

and in order to do that, we first created a 3D model,

and then, with thermography, we went on to discover

hidden windows. These are the original windows of the hall

of the Sala Grande. We also found out about the height

of the ceiling, and we managed to reconstruct, therefore,

including a staircase that was very important

in order to precisely place "The Battle of Anghiari"

on a specific area of one of the two walls.

Well, we also learned that Vasari, who was commissioned

to remodel the Hall of the 500 between 1560 and 1574

by the Grand Duke Cosimo I of the Medici family,

we have at least two instances when he saved masterpieces

specifically by placing a brick wall in front of it

One that we [see] here, Masaccio, the church of Santa Maria Novella in Florence,

so we just said, well maybe, Visari has done something

like that in the case of this great work of art by Leonardo,

since he was a great admirer of Leonardo da Vinci.

And so we built some very sophisticated radio antennas

just for probing both walls and searching for an air gap.

And we did find many on the right panel of the east wall,

or at least the part that we know has been painted,

which is called "The Fight for the Standard," should be located.

So I decided to go back to my alma mater,

and, at the University of California, San Diego,

and I proposed to open up a research center

for engineering sciences for cultural heritage.

And in 2007, we created CISA3 as a research center

for cultural heritage, specifically art, architecture

and archaeology. So students started to flow in,

and we started to build technologies, because that's

basically what we also needed in order to move forward

We came back in the Hall of the 500 in 2011,

and this time, with a great group of students,

and my colleague, Professor Falko Kuester,

came back just since we knew already where to look for

to find out if there was still something left.

Well, we were confined though, limited, I should rather say,

for several reasons that it's not worth explaining,

to endoscopy only, of the many other options we had,

we were successful in documenting and taking

some fragments of what it turns out to be

a reddish color, black color, and there is some

XRF, X-ray diffraction, and the results are very positive

we have found some pigments, and since we know for sure

that no other artist has painted on that wall

before Vasari came in about 60 years later, well,

those pigments are therefore firmly related to mural painting

Well, we are searching for the highest and highly praised

As a matter of fact, this is by far the most important

and for doing this great masterpiece, he was named

the number one artist influence at the time.

I had also had the privilege since the last 37 years

to work on several masterpieces as you can see behind me,

but basically to do what? Well, to assess, for example,

the state of conservation. See here the face of the

Madonna of the Chair that when just shining a UV light on it

you suddenly see another, different lady,

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【TED】Maurizio Seracini: The secret lives of paintings (Maurizio Seracini: The secret lives of paintings)

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