Opening: Madame de Pompadour in the frame,
An exhibition at Waddesdon Manor

Factum Foundation has completed facsimiles of two portraits by Boucher for the exhibition ‘Madame de Pompadour in the Frame,’ to be held at Waddesdon Manor in Buckinghamshire, UK (May 23rd-October 20th, 2019). The exhibition offers a rare opportunity for viewers to directly compare a painting with its facsimile, and to see another facsimile within its historic frame, now separated from the original. Further details on both the facsimiles and exhibition can be found here.

Digital and physical reconstruction of the vandalised sacred cave of Kamukuwaká

The cave of Kamukuwaká, an important sacred petroglyph site representing the cosmogony of the inhabitants of Upper-Xingu (Mato Grosso, Brasil) and registered national monument has been intentionally destroyed in 2018. Factum Foundation recorded the cave and the digital restoration is now complete. All resources are being focused on the physical reconstruction of the cave that will be sent to Brazil upon completion. Find out more.

Save the Whitechapel Bell foundry

We need your help! The historic foundry, the UK's oldest continuous manufacturing business until its closure in 2017, is facing being converted into a 'bell-themed boutique hotel' by its new property developer owners. More information on these plans to decimate this historical and cultural icon can be found here, whilst Factum Foundation's full proposal to save it can be read here.

Details on how you can help prevent this from happening can be found through this Spitalfields Life article.

Canova's Equestrian Statue

Following the success of the maquette recording of Canova's equestrian statue at the Museo Civico di Bassano del Grappa and under the initiative of Chiara Casarin, the director of the museum, Factum Foundation embarked on a much more ambitious project: to create a digital model of the horse, the plaster prototype for which was made by Canova shortly before his death.

More details on this extraordinary project can be found here.

PARMIGIANINO'S 'SELF-PORTRAIT IN A CONVEX MIRROR'

Factum Foundation was asked to create a facsimile of this work for MUMOK's exhibition ‘Vertigo. Op Art and a History of Deception 1520 –1970’, which will run from May to October 2019; this will explore the Op-Art movement of the 1960s and its roots in historical artistic movements that have contemplated the nature of perception and illusion. Find out more about the recording and complex reproduction process.

Recording “The Circle” Stradivari with the Lucida 3D Laser Scanner

Factum Foundation is collaborating with luthiers Julia Sarano and Robert Brewer Young on a pilot project to create a unique 3D study of a rare violin, “The Circle” Stradivari, with a precision measured in microns, as part of a multi-layered instrument archive. The instrument is generously on loan for this study from London violin dealers J&A Beare. Data recorded with the Lucida 3D Laser Scanner, will be used to scale a high-resolution photogrammetry model of the instrument.

Facsimile of a ceiling by Giuseppe Salviati

A sixteenth-century circular ceiling canvas, painted by Giuseppe Salviati (Giuseppe Porta) for the Palazzo Grimani in Venice but now in the Musée Jaquemart-André in Paris, has been re-materialised as a facsimile and installed in its original location. You can find out more about making and installing the facsimile ceiling here.

PHOTOGRAMMETRY

Find out more about the processes behind photogrammetry: the 3D recording technique at the heart of many of Factum Foundation's projects.

Involving taking hundreds of overlapping photographs of an object from many different angles and processing them using specialised software, photogrammetry produces geometrically precise, but also highly detailed, 3D models of artworks and artefacts.

Digitisation of Manuscripts in Dagestan

The manuscript digitisation project at the IHAE in Dagestan has led to the discovery of a palimpsest with a 6th century Gospel of Luke. The original text was in the ancient Georgian script Asomtavruli written underneath a later Arabic text. It is one of only ten such manuscripts known to exist. Digitisation opens new avenues in scholarship ­– in this case, the high-resolution images of the palimpsest have been handed over to a Georgian specialist who continues the investigation into this unique object. Read more.

Scanning the "Mappa Turchesca"

Factum Foundation has recorded the cherry-wood printing blocks (matrices) of the 16th-century “Mappa Turchesca”, in an ARCHiVe project undertaken together with two students from the Università Iuav di Venezia (IUAV). The heart-shaped map, now in the Biblioteca Marciana in Venice, has text in both Arabic and Ottoman Turkish, and was probably designed by Venetian cartographers for sale to Ottoman buyers. For more information on this recording that will allow damaged portions of the map to be digitally restored and printed in 3D, please click here.

BACK TO WORK IN LUXOR

Factum Foundation are pleased to announce that work is now restarting on the tomb of Seti I, a crucial step in completing one of the central goals of the Theban Necropolis Preservation Initiative: to record and re-materialise the entire ancient site. Based at the recently restored Stoppelaëre House nearby, this work will be led by an entirely Egyptian team trained by the Foundation who will also be undertaking the teaching of local trainees in the areas of digitising and archiving their own cultural heritage.

Read more here.

The 'Virgen de las Nieves'

In February 2019, the facsimile of a terracotta icon of the ‘Virgen de las Nieves’ produced by Factum Arte, alongside a protective shell for the original, was officially inaugurated in a presentation by the governing council to the people of La Palma, the most north-westerly island of the Canary archipelago.

More about the project can be found here.

In collaboration with Océ: digitising and rematerialising Rembrandt's ‘Portrait of an Elderly Man’

Factum Foundation has combined with long-time collaborators Océ for the recording and reproduction of the piece by the Dutch Master. The recording was undertaken at the Mauritshuis in December 2018, with the Lucida 3D Scanner and panoramic photography. The high resolution colour and relief information recorded by the Foundation was used by Océ to create a replica with Elevated Printing technology. Learn more.
Image © Clemens Weijkamp, Océ

Digitising Bartolomé Esteban Murillo

In 2017, Factum Foundation documented two paintings by Murillo at the Hermandad de la Santa Caridad in Seville, using the Lucida scanner, composite photography, and photogrammetry. High-resolution colour reproductions have been made from the data at a 1:1 scale; these will be displayed in the Hermandad de la Santa Caridad in a setting which will allow visitors to examine these magnificent works at close range. More details on the project can be found here.