[MSN] A peace offering from Italy begins new era at the MFA.

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A peace offering from Italy begins new era at the MFA
By Geoff Edgers, Globe Staff  |  November 29, 2006

The crate arrived at the Museum of Fine Arts two weeks ago. It contained two
marble pieces, a 90-pound head and a 7-foot torso, that had once been buried
in a field just outside Rome. The marching orders followed. The MFA needed
its conservators to put together this ancient statue in time for yesterday's
ceremony announcing the Italian government's historic loan of the statue to
the MFA. Normally, a restoration of this nature takes months.

 "I thought it was totally insane," said Susanne Gänsicke, the MFA's acting
head of objects conservation.

But she would try. After all, the piece was special, the first to be loaned
to the MFA under a deal that the museum had made in September to return
looted works to Italy. Italian officials had shown evidence to the MFA that
the museum possessed antiquities dug up illegally in Italy and sold to the
museum by shady dealers. As a result, the MFA returned 13 objects to Rome.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art has signed a similar agreement with the
Italian government. But the MFA is the first to reap the benefits of what
everyone is billing as a cultural exchange.

The guests at yesterday's event included MFA trustees, a 40-plus member
delegation from Italy including Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of
Culture Francesco Rutelli and more than two dozen reporters from the United
States and overseas.

The real star, though, waited in the corner of the gallery under a gray
sheet. Eirene, the goddess of peace, is made of marble and dates back to the
first half of the first century. The statue was discovered in 1986 by a
farmer plowing his fields about 20 miles northeast of Rome. The Italian
government decided to loan it to the MFA because a 6-foot-tall marble statue
of Sabina, the wife of Emperor Hadrian, was among the objects the MFA had
returned to Rome. The Sabina had been on display at the MFA until September.

"We wanted to replace that which they had volunteered to return with
something comparable in beauty and size," said Daniel Berger, an adviser to
the Italian minister of culture.

First, though, Eirene would have to be put together. Gänsicke quickly called
in Louise Freedman, a sculptor and freelance conservator who has frequently
worked at the MFA.

"I'm used to a triage call, a 'Quick, can you save this?' " Freedman said.

The armless Eirene, never before displayed in one piece, needed help. There
was a hollowed-out space the size of a chicken where the figure's chest
should have been. That left Eirene's head with nothing to rest on.

So Freedman used clay to form a mold for a new plaster chest that would
substitute for the missing marble. Usually, conservationists let plaster
cure for about two weeks. Not this time. On a tight deadline, Freedman
commandeered a small oven usually used for scientific projects at the
museum. She had the plaster bake over Thanksgiving. Concerned about the
head's weight, Freedman had a bronze pin inserted into the open space in the
torso to help support the head.

On Monday at 9 a.m., Freedman was finished. A half hour later, MFA workers
came to move the piece to get it ready for the ceremony.

Starting today, in the MFA's Roman Court Gallery, the statue will be seen by
the public for the first time with the head attached . Early reviews were
strong. When Rutelli and Malcolm Rogers, the MFA's director, unveiled the
statue together, the MFA filled with whistles and applause.

"As you can see, it's a really remarkable, great statue," said Rutelli. "And
nobody has seen it."

Geoff Edgers can be reached at gedgers at globe.com. For more arts news, visit
boston.com/ae/theater_arts/exhibitionist. 

http://www.boston.com/