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Fortunately, this collection has had some very good restorers. Some were painters whose works are included in the Royal Collection and others were restorers who worked at the Museo del Prado and the Museo de la Trinidad. The work of all these restorers has enabled us to preserve a collection that still serves as a veritable point of reference for good art conservation at a worldwide level. The Prado has been visited by museum heads and experts from New York, from the Louvre and from different museums, all of whom have admired the excellent state of preservation of the Museum’s works.
Former restorers may well have failed to understand the works and carried out selective cleaning processes, as I’ve said. Above all, they retouched the original colours too much. But they never, or almost never, carried out far-reaching or drastic cleaning procedures. In this respect, when the works were handed down to us we were able to clean the pictures and the majority were in a good state of preservation under the dirty varnishes and retouched areas. So we have created a chain of custody, because we have taken over from the previous generation, and others will come after us. But if we are careful to respect and understand the works, we can hand them down in a good condition. Some pictures, in spite of how dirty they may have become over the years, have been cleaned and now look as if they’ve literally just come out of the painter’s studio. I’m thinking, for example, of Titian’s The Burial of Christ, whose impasto, glaze and canvas texture are so well-preserved that the work looks as if it’s just been painted. It’s one of my favourite paintings and it was enormously satisfying to be able to restore it. I’m delighted that it has been so well preserved up until now. If you look at the latest Titian paintings that have been restored, this palpitating depiction of Christ makes you cry when you see that a painting of this kind has been handed down to us in such good condition after so many centuries, having belonged to the Emperor Charles V. This painting has been so well restored that it looks as if it’s just left Titian’s studio. And all this is thanks to Elisa Mora, who, with her fine sensibility, knowledge and preparation, has gradually managed to bring out the real Titian from beneath the gloom.
He works at the Restoration Workshop of the Museo del Prado, specializing in the works of El Greco. He is also Professor of Restoration at the Official School of Applied Arts in Madrid, and he received the National Prize for Conservation and Restoration of Cultural Goods in 2010.
Interview recorded on April 19, 2018
