Restoration of the Reliquary Arches preserved in the Chapel of the Relics of the Cathedral of Palermo

At the same time as the ongoing restoration of the Chapel of Santa Rosalia, the restoration of all the silver reliquary urns with wooden bases contained within the Chapel of the Relics of the Cathedral of Palermo is about to begin, which have not been worked on for over a hundred years.
The operations include the restoration of the carved, painted, gilded and silvered wooden structures that support the silver bases containing the relics of the beloved saints and martyrs of Palermo and Sicily, cases characterized by metal elements in molten, embossed and chiseled silver.
Specifically, the project includes the intervention on the 6 reliquary urns surmounted by a silver structure: Sant’Agata (formerly of S. Rosalia), Santa Ninfa, Santa Maria Maddalena, San Mamiliano, Santa Cristina, saints Eustazio Proculo and Golbodeo, the reliquary urn of San Cosma consisting of a gilded and painted wooden structure and the 10 carved wooden reliquaries. The works commissioned by the Palermo Senate and the Cathedral between the 16th and 18th centuries were entrusted to skilled Sicilian master carvers and silversmiths.
The interventions will concern the wooden structure which is severely structurally compromised both by the nature of the materials themselves and by their aging and by the various previous interventions. The wood will be adequately treated with biocidal substances for the prevention and elimination of previous entomatic attacks and will be consolidated in all its stratigraphic components; the deficiencies will then be repaired, the superimposed substances will be removed with targeted cleaning operations and the structural and aesthetic continuity of the artifacts will be restored to allow for correct reading and use.
The metal structures will be completely cleaned of the thick layers of dirt spread through washes containing surfactants and appropriately studied solutions. The compromised sheets will be straightened and adequately integrated.
The restoration intervention will be accompanied by related cognitive and diagnostic investigations.
The restoration will be carried out by doctors Rosalia Merra and Agata Evelina Di Marco for the wooden structures and by doctor Giuseppe Mercurio and the master silversmiths and engravers Benedetto and Mauro Gelardi for the metal components.