Il restauro critico: significati storici e aspetti attuali nella conservazione dell'architettura

La tesi ha approfondito la teoria del restauro critico, alla luce della dimensione ormai storica da essa assunta e dell'evoluzione del nostro contesto culturale, con l'obiettivo di verificare, allo stato attuale, la sua validità, così come 'definita', dal punto di vista sia concettuale che operativo. Pertanto, è stata effettuata una verifica della corrispondenza tra gli assunti teorici consolidati e condivisi e le relative realizzazioni, attraverso un'esegesi del percorso teorico che ha condotto alla codificazione del restauro critico, dai primi embrionali concetti fino ai contributi più recenti, analizzando quindi l'iter segnato dagli autori che hanno dato ad essa apporti e contributi.Ai fini degli obiettivi fissati, è apparso opportuno rivolgere l'attenzione alle realizzazioni relative ad un arco temporale ben definito, coincidente con gli ultimi venti anni, vale a dire a partire dagli anni Novanta del secolo scorso, periodo in cui il 'restauro critico' aveva assunto una dimensione storicamente definita, fino ai nostri giorni.Si è quindi cercato di enucleare dall'ampio e variegato dibattito sul restauro architettonico, svolto a partire dal secondo dopoguerra e poi specificamente nel suddetto periodo di riferimento, quei temi significativi dell'approccio critico alla conservazione, sviluppando quindi questioni volte a cogliere quelli che possono esser considerati i 'significati' storici del restauro critico. Altresì, è apparso opportuno effettuare una sorta di verifica inversa, partendo dagli esiti, ossia dai casi realizzati, al fine di cogliere quali 'aspetti' il restauro critico ha oggi nella conservazione dell'architettura

The identities of Luxembourgish landscape: the Echternach site and a challenge for an integrated perspective of its protection and valorization

The Luxembourg’s landscape is one of the most interesting in Europe. Concentrated in a small territory, it represents a synthesis of the characteristics of Northern European landscape. During this last decade the economic development meant a great growth for buildings enterprises and also several impact on the identity of the Luxembourgish landscape. The institutions involved in landscape management are three Ministries and there is an Observatory of natural environment. The contribution aims to analyze current landscape policies and also to deepen methodological and theoretical aspects that currently have to be considered by policies, with particular reference to the historical site of Echternach that, in the past, has been involved in an UNESCO study and shows us the need considering, at the same time, urban site and natural landscape. This allows us to verify the present challenges for an effective action to protect and valorise the Luxembourgish identity

GPR and Digital Survey for the Diagnosis and the 3D Representation of the Battle of Issus Mosaic from the House of the Faun, Pompeii (Naples, Italy)

The application of non-invasive geophysical techniques and digital surveys to explore cultural heritage is becoming a very important research field. The capability to detect inner and superficial changes in the inspected surfaces allows for imaging spatial inhomogeneity and material features and planning targeted conservation and restoration interventions. In this work, the results of a research project carried out on the famous Battle of Issus Mosaic, also known as the “Alexander Mosaic”, are presented. It is a masterpiece of ancient art that was found in 1831 in the House of Faun, the most luxurious and spacious house in Pompeii. It is notable for its size (3.41 × 5.82 m), the quality of workmanship and the subject that represents the culminating phase of the battle between Alexander Magno’s army and the Persian one of Darius. In 1916, it was moved inside the National Archaeological Museum of Naples, where the original horizontal location was changed with a vertical arrangement supported by an inner wooden structure, whose exact manufacture is unclear. Today, the mosaic is affected by important instability phenomena highlighted by the appearance of the significant detachment of tiles, superficial lesions and swelling of the surface. Given the important need to preserve it, a high-detail diagnostic study was realized through a digital survey and non-invasive geophysical surveys using ground-penetrating radar (GPR). The investigation was repeated after two years, in 2018 and 2020, with the aim of verifying the evolution of degradation. The work provided a high-resolution estimate of the state of the health of the mosaic and allowed for obtaining a three-dimensional reconstruction of the internal mosaic structure, including the formulation of hypotheses on the engineering supporting works of the twentieth century; this provides an essential tool for the imminent conservation project, which also implies restoring the original horizontal position