Pigeons find hidden Spain fresco

Pigeons lead way to lost Renaissance fresco

DANIEL WOOLLS IN MADRID


PIGEONS flying through a hole in the ceiling of a Spanish cathedral have led an art restoration team to discover a Renaissance fresco that had been covered up for more than 300 years.

The team had been working on the baroque dome of the cathedral in Valencia for more than a month, removing grey paint and fending off birds flying in and out of the hole.

Then a team leader, Javier Catala, stuck a digital camera inside, shot blindly and was rewarded with partial but spectacular images of a well preserved fresco. The baroque ceiling turned out to be a false one that masked a fresco completed by the Italian painters Francesco Pagano and Paolo de San Leocadio in 1481.

The fresco is one of the earliest examples of Italian Renaissance art imported to Spain, said Fernando Lopez, an art historian.

The baroque work covering the fresco was ordered in 1674 when church officials deemed that smoke from candles had darkened the fresco, the Valencia government said.

Records show that when the Italians finished the fresco, church officials didn't like it and refused to pay the agreed fee of 3,000 gold ducats. The painters appealed to the governor of Valencia and won.

After the restoration team presents a technical report, the Roman Catholic Church and the Valencian regional government will decide whether to strip away the baroque ceiling and display the fresco, Spanish officials said.

The cathedral in Valencia dates back to 1262, but it wasn't completed until the late 18th century