By Carles Mancho, University of Barcelona
Virtual tools are helping art historians in Barcelona to “reconstruct” the isolated church interiors where romanesque murals once appeared, in order to visualize their scattered pieces as an integral whole. With the new tools and the creation of the Virtual Romanesque Documentation Centre (Ars Picta), Spain’s cultural heritage is now viewable by everyone everywhere. Problems of remote location, difficult access and dispersal to the world’s museums and similar obstacles are being minimized.
Catalan painter Joan Vallhonrat had an unpleasant surprise in the summer of 1919. He was making his second visit to the castle and church of Santa Maria de Mur (Pallars Jussà, Catalonia) to finish the colour reproduction of the magnificent 12th century Romanesque paintings there. The trip was difficult and long because there were no roads. Yet when he arrived in the isolated location he was surprised — and shocked — to discover an antiquarian and his team doing something unexpected: they were removing the mural paintings from the walls.