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EN
The Late Romanesque church of St.John the Baptist and St. Catherine in Świerzawa, which dates from the second quarter of the thirteenth century, is one of the more valuable monuments in Poland. Its rank is heightened by the numerous paintings from the thirteenth-fifteenth centuries discovered in the last decade. The state of preservation and the pattern of the layers of paintings in the apse are a source’of complicated conservation problems. The first such problem concerns the liquidation of the detachment of plaster on the vault of the apse. The affected layer of plaster detached from tha base, together w ith the paintings, hung under the vault supported by the wall along its incline, and by later additions to the mortar. The detachments were characterized by very large distances betweens the walls of the blisters ( up to 10 cms ), and thus by a large capacity of their interiors as well as by cracked plaster. It was impossible to press the detached layers back or to fill the blisters with the aid of material up to then applied for such operations. In a search for new material, attention was drawn to the foam of certain synthetics and the exploitation of this property for the liquidation of the detachments. The material which met of the requirements proved to be stiff polyurethane foam.,The method prepared in the course of research and trials was successfully used on the vault of the apse. The second equally important problem was the display of the paintings. At the moment, there are three layers of paintings on the wall and vault of the apse. The oldest ( second quarter of thirteenth century ) consists of zoomorfic and ornamental depictions, connected with the symbol of the Tree of Life. On the vault, this painting is covered by two successive versions of the Last Judgement [ from the fourteenth(?) and fifteenth centuries]. The oldest extant painting is in good condition but the other two are fragmentary. Of the several possible conceptions for displaying the paintings, two were taken into the consideration, and demonstrated on models of the interior of the apse. The first assumed a total uncovering of the original decoration and, therefore, the attainment of an uniform Romanesque interior. The acceptance of such a solution would have to result in a destruction of the Gothic paintings, since it was impossible to separate and transfer them into a mobile base. The second conception permitted a joint display of all the surviving paintings. After the merits and faults of both solutions were discussed, it was decided to realize the second proposal.
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