Frans Francken II: The Wedding of Neptune and Amphitrite 12. June 2025

The comparison makes the change in condition due to the restoration particularly comprehensible.

The underdrawings are clearly visible in the infrared reflectography.

The underlying wood structures become visible in the X-ray image.

Also of interest:

12. June 2025 — Watch / Video
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The Sermon of Saint John the Baptist (after Pieter Bruegel the Elder)

Pieter Bruegel the Elder was one of the most influential and successful painters of the 16th century. Particularly innovative pictorial creations such as “The Sermon of Saint John the Baptist” (Budapest, Szépművészeti Múzeum) were copied in large numbers by his sons Pieter Brueghel the Younger and Jan Brueghel the Elder as well as other artists. Today there are 36 repetitions of the motif, among which the Dresden version, with its exceptionally high quality, occupies a prominent place. The film provides an insight into the elaborate restoration of the painting.

21. October 2021 — Read / Article (4 minutes)
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Vermeer’s generosity

In many ways, Tom Hunter’s “Woman reading a Possession Order” seems to capture the effect of Vermeer’s original painting “Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window”. Yet if one looks more closely at Hunter’s photograph from 1997, differences become apparent. Jane Boddy on an iconic image and its contemporary appropriations.

20. September 2022 — Read / Article
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3D printing meets porcelain restoration

Every German knows the saying about the elephant in the china shop (in English it’s usually „the bull“) and so it may come as a surprise that there are elephants in Dresden's Porzellansammlung (porcelain collection). However, these are themselves made of the fine material and so they do not cause any damage, but would rather themselves be threatened by the dangers that the proverbial elephant means for the precious material. In a cooperation with Fraunhofer IKTS, it has now been possible to restore one of the elephants in the Porzellansammlung that was missing its trunk using 3D printing.