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In Search of Hidden Treasures:
Art Detective to Head New Center Blending Art and Science
Ioana Patringenaru | March 5, 2007
He has taken X-rays of hundreds of Renaissance masterpieces, including works by Leonardo Da Vinci. He has used just about every ray in the spectrum to study more than 2,500 of the world’s most important paintings, frescoes, statues and monuments. His work got him mentioned in the best-selling “Da Vinci Code.” Now he is going to head a ground-breaking center at UCSD.
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CISA3 director Maurizio Seracini, with a detail of Leonardo Da Vinci's "Annunciation" in the background. (Photo/ Kevin Walsh) |
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The university announced Wednesday that Maurizio Seracini, an alumnus and real-world “Da Vinci Code” character, will head the campus’ new Center of Interdisciplinary Science for Art, Architecture and Archaeology. The center, also known as CISA3, is billed as the first institution devoted to using and developing advanced technologies to understand and conserve works of art, monumental buildings and archaeological sites.
“Science can bring so much to our understanding and our appreciation of art,” said Seracini, “and we are creating a new discipline where art and engineering go hand-in-hand.”
The center will develop new technologies to peer beyond the surface of works of art and peel away their layers, Seracini said during a press conference Wednesday at UCSD. Researchers also will use current technologies to scan and analyze paintings, sculptures and buildings and help decide how to best handle and restore them.
The new center is part of the California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology. It represents a collaboration between the university’s division of arts and humanities and the Jacobs School of Engineering. Ultimately, the goal is to create a new kind of scientist, the engineer of cultural heritage, with a strong background in the arts and humanities as well as in engineering and science, Seracini said.
“Few universities can offer an environment where artists are encouraged to learn hard science and engineers are encouraged to study the arts and humanities,” UCSD Chancellor Marye Anne Fox said. “This new center has the goal of blending the student into a new type of researcher and practitioner who can help preserve our shared cultural heritage.”
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Seracini and other officials during a press conference at Calit2 Wednesday, with pictures of Florence's Medici Palace in the background. |
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Seracini could definitely serve as the prototype for this new species of scientists. He has long argued that great art should be treated in the same way physicians treat their patients: by maintaining clinical charts based on extensive tests. He also has a long track record doing just this kind of work.
Seracini used cutting-edge technology to search for Da Vinci’s long-lost “Battle of Anghiari,” a fresco that may be hidden in Palazzo Vecchio, a famous palace in Florence. He also conducted a plethora of high-tech tests to shed light on one of the Da Vinci’s best-known paintings, the “Adoration of the Magi.” That earned him a mention in Dan Brown’s “The Da Vinci Code,” where the author says that Seracini “unveiled the unsettling truth” about Leonardo’s work. Seracini contends that the “Adoration” as we know it today wasn’t done by Da Vinci. But a magnificent work of art, drawn by the master, is hidden beneath, he says. Seracini also says he’s not speculating. He reached his conclusions after scanning the work with a wide array of tools.
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CISA3 director Seracini |
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Joining Seracini at CISA3 are 17 investigators, whose specialties range from engineering to archeology. A handful of undergraduate students also have signed up. CISA3 teams will fan around the world, starting with Florence, where scientists have been given privileged access to many of the Renaissance’s greatest works of art.
In fact, they already have started to work. In January, Seracini and colleagues put Da Vinci’s “The Annunciation” through a thorough examination in Florence, before the painting gets shipped this spring to Japan for a major exhibit. During Wednesday’s press conference, Seracini unveiled some preliminary results, including a gorgeously detailed under-drawing of a flowing robe. Further results will be released in late spring.
Next on the list is Florence’s Palazzo Medici, or Medici Palace. The President of the Province of Florence, Matteo Renzi, signed an agreement Wednesday with UCSD officials, which gives researchers the green light to scan and analyze the building inch by inch. Scientists will look for hidden murals and artifacts in the palace and chart changes in its structure over the past 500 years. “The Medici Palace isn’t just a palace, it’s the first symbol of the Renaissance,” said Renzi, who has his office in the building. The project will help fulfill Florence’s responsibility to care for its treasures, he added. “Today, we share not only a project, not only an idea,” Renzi said. “We must not only remember the past, we must also construct our future.”
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Seracini with Ramesh Rao, director of UCSD's division of Calit2 (left) and Matteo Renzi, president of the Province of Florence.
(Photo/ Kevin Walsh) |
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CISA3 also has reached an agreement to create digital clinical charts based on state-of-the-art scanning techniques for major works in the San Diego Museum of Art’s collection. The museum will now be the first in the world to have such charts, as a baseline for future restoration efforts, Seracini said.
The charts will help the museum learn how the works were created, said Executive Director Derrick Cartwright. Researchers also will learn more about how the works were handled by their previous owners, their current state and how best to care for them, he said. Scientists will examine the “Portrait of a Man,” by Italian Renaissance artist Giorgione and Juan Sánchez Cotán’s “Quince, Cabbage, Melon and Cucumber.” The investigations’ results will be made public, Seracini said.
Meanwhile, Tom Levy, a UCSD archeologist and CISA3 investigator, hopes to raise funds for a “Digital Atlas of the Holy Land,” which will go back 1.5 million years. The atlas would combine satellite images, databases and 3-D images of historical sites in Israel and Jordan, Levy said. Practical applications would include guided tours with 3-D images available on cell phones.
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CISA3 investigator Jurgen Schulze demonstrated a high-end visualization tool at Wednesday's press conference. |
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Seracini also hopes CISA3 will help him end his quest for Da Vinci’s “Battle of Anghiari.” He started looking for the fresco in the mid-1970s. From 2000 to 2002, he used radar and infrared to scan the Palazzo Vecchio’s walls, looking for a clue to the painting’s location. Results lead him to believe that the fresco might be hidden behind a double wall, which is itself covered with another fresco. Italy’s culture minister recently announced a committee would take a look at Seracini’s proposals for somehow probing behind that wall. The search has been on for three decades. Seracini said he hopes it will wrap up soon.
“We’re adding knowledge,” he said. “We’re really pushing forward in that direction.”
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