RESTORATION OF RELIGIOUSWORKS: A MODEL FOR TEACHING CONSERVATION

The season of restoration sponsored by the Archdiocese of Urbino-Urbania-Sant’Angelo in Vado, Italy in collaboration with the Carlo Bo Urbino University has recently introduced an unprecedented learning experience and laboratory that is strengthened by the collaboration with the Superintendency and the Municipalities of Urbino and Sant’Angelo in Vado. According to Cesare Brandi, restoration comes from the need to restore objects from the decay of the culture of our country. These items must be rediscovered with a renewed awareness that they are indeed products of Art, and bearers of universal values. Restoration work is closely related to this recognition of the value of art, in terms of its aesthetic, historical and poetic aspects. It is by identifying the object as a work of art that one may understand the meaning that binds it to the operator. Understanding art as such makes the historical context of human expression visible through its aesthetic qualities. It is through this awareness that restoration becomes science, and thus able to identify and understand the object as a work of art. The ability to save new works, such as those described in this paper, which would inevitably fall into decay and neglect, is seen as an opportunity for students to compete their education, by working with a complete work of art: from the early stages of knowledge and analysis through to the intervention choices, with the support of their teachers, the Superintendency and the Religious Authorities, and the final exhibition of the same.