Appeal for the wooden painted ceiling of Steri
Defined by Ferdinando Bologna “never repeated and unequalled encyclopaedia-ceiling”, with its 440 square metres of tempera paintings on wood, it is a rare and amazing testimony of the variegated medieval culture, with its complex and articulate iconographic narration, interweaving with high narrative wisdom biblical, chivalresque and mytological stories, and also an extraordinary example of a more than achieved fusion between the re-interpretation of a high local tradition and the knowledge of the latest Islamic ceilings of Maghreb’s coast, as well as of Spanish “artesonados”; this and much more is the wooden ceiling covering the “Sala dei Baroni” within the fourteenth century Chiaramonte Palace, the so-called “Steri”.
Yet this jewel, of which the cultural value is known in the world, risks to collapse, for being attacked by termites.
The knowledge of the causes of this serious illness is due to a multidisciplinary research activity asked by the University of Palermo, aiming at ascertaining the reasons of the deterioration and defining which protocol should be adopted for the definitive restoration, gave two important results:
an accurate monitoring, under the supervision of the Superintendence for the Cultural and Environmental Heritage of a “pilot action”, financed by the University, co-ordinated and directed by the Technical department of the University.
The starting of the operational planning of the restoration of the whole ceiling, aiming at eliminating the causes of deterioration and to implementing all the actions for its preservation and glamorisation.
We must point out that the cost for this group of works is estimated about €3.000.000,00 (including sums which are available for the University administration), and that it is extremely difficult to raise such a sum; at the same time, the interventions required cannot be postponed, in order to avoid the risk of irremediably loosing such an heritage.
We appeal therefore to all institutions, to the culture world, as well as to those entrepreneurs and industrialists who are sensitive to the priceless value of art.
The appeal of the University of Palermo is subscribed by: