architecture, furniture, and other decorative arts. All of these were prod-
ucts of a unique moment in European history, rich in humanist interests,
scientific pursuit, and artistic expression. During this vibrant time of
curiosity and imagination, a historic consciousness emerged that was not
only new to a whole generation of nobility but also new to middle-class
merchants and artisans. Human and architectural proportions and nature
were studied in depth, as were such abstract subjects as volume, color,
light, and perspective.
Therefore, we cannot simply talk about the preservation of a room
with intarsia wall panels and a polychrome ceiling that happens to have been
built at the end of the fifteenth century. The studiolo, constructed at the
height ofthe Italian Renaissance, was designed with great deliberation,
every component serving a purpose, and even the seemingly casual place-
ment of the tesserae was carefully considered. The studiolo strongly reflects
th e zeitgeist of the Renaissance. During the current conservation treatment,
the goal of maintaining the integrity of the intarsia wall panels and poly-
chrome ceiling has been at least as important as the physical preservation of
the material. The aesthetic pleasure that Federico and his son Guidobaldo da
Montefeltro must have felt upon entering the studiolo is what we should be
able to feel today. As Talley says, no object should be considered solely as “a
thing, with ailments.” His description at the beginning of this article of the
generic Flemish landscape painting as a “magical, jeweller’s landscape” cap-
tures the essence ofevery work of art (Talley 1992).^9
With these aesthetic considerations foremost, the conservation
treatment of the Gubbio studiolo has proceeded; requirements have ranged
from cleaning, consolidating, and retouching the intarsia and polychrome
paint to fabricating complicated replacements for both the intarsia panels
and the polychrome ceiling components. The focus of this article is the
treatment of the supports of the intarsia panels and the coffered ceiling.^10
The main concept of the conservation treatment can be summa-
rized as follows: to preserve and restore the fifteenth-century character of
the studiolo. All the original elements ofthe room were to be conserved^11
and the nineteenth- and twentieth-century restorations kept, where
possible. These later restorations were respected as part of the history
of the studiolo; even so, they were replaced in areas where the initial
fifteenth-century intention of the intarsia panel had been misinterpreted,
and the restorations had consequently disfigured the image. The intarsia-
tori executed original intarsia panels with a sophisticated sense ofthe
delicate play between light and shadow and with a superb eye for detail.
Today the aged wood still displays more contrast and a warmer tone scale
than many of the later restorations, which have discolored—competing
with, rather than complementing, the fifteenth-century elements.^12 Much
of the treatment, therefore, consisted of integrating past restorations to
bring out a coherence that had been compromised, within the intarsia
panels and between the intarsia panels and the polychrome elements.
New additions were kept to a minimum, and where possible they were
made reversible. Unfortunately, the polychrome paint of the ceiling ele-
ments had sustained considerable damage over time, and the later restora-
tions had badly discolored and flaked. These previous restorations were,
therefore, completely removed. This removal prompted extensive repaint-
ing, which was possible because of the repetitive decorative pattern of
the ornamentation.A R S D P G 485