Restoration work is underway on the finds of Mont’e Prama brought to light in the excavations of the Superintendence between 2014 and 2016. The nuraghe models are being worked on in the Calamosca in Cagliari, while in Cabras in the one created inside the Civic Museum, under the attentive and curious gaze of visitors, thanks to the collaboration with the Mont’e Prama Foundation. This is how restorers work cleaning of the “Cavalupo” type boxer: the earth deposits accumulated on the statue over three thousand years are removed. The removal takes place with small mechanical tools and great delicacy, with the aim of bringing the residual surface of the sculpture to light.
Thus, slowly, the details that the skilled stonemasons of nuragic age they modeled on the soft limestone. The great technical ability emerges in the representation of the young man armed with the large enveloping shield held firmly with his left arm and hand. Just as in the eyes, rendered geometrically by perfect concentric circular incisions, in the schematic T-shaped profile of the eyebrow arches and nose and in the small ears, extraordinarily shaped in the search for a natural proportion.
At the same time as cleaning, the restorers, together with the archaeologists, they also carry out the search for the attacks, examining hundreds of sculptural fragments from the excavation, identifying those that can contribute to the recomposition of the statue, to complete its original form as much as possible. In the images (from the social page of Superintendency of Cagliari) some moments of this meticulous research with some matching fragments, just found in correspondence with theright forearm.
In addition to these activities, in the laboratory we proceed to document every aspect of the find and, with delicate handling operations, the sculpture is positioned so that every centimeter can be examined to verify which methods and strategies to adopt. With equal caution – we read on the page – the sculpture was also weighed: an operation that required particular care in planning the handling methods, considering the delicacy of the stone material, which weighed more than 300 kilos.
The restoration works are designed and directed by the Superintendence staff, with ministerial funds at the head of the Regional secretariat for the cultural heritage of Sardinia and are entrusted to a specialized company.
