Giannina Machicado reports for La Prensa:
The facade of the heritage building now looks indian red
The National Museum of Art recovers the Baroque Mestizo polychrome
The repository will look equally vivid colors in interior walls. a color change will be made every two to three years.
The National Art Museum (MNA) looks, from two weeks ago, a deep red color on its facade. The recent change that is noticed and questioned by some passersby, responds to the recovery of polychromatic features of the mestizo-baroque architecture, according to the director of that repository, Galo Coca.
Based on a previous study, the decision was made in order to not only recover the memory of the building, built heritage, but also to raise adequate location for a museum in the XXI century. Therefore, also it reaches the painted interior walls, which will be in relation to museum contents.
It was said the change in color will be gradually, every two to three years in the same line.
The reopening of the museum is planned for the first quarter of 2016, in preparation for the 50th anniversary of the museum, to be held in August next year.
ORIGINAL
“The color change arises from maintenance work currently done in the heritage building. It was decided to recover much of the original architecture. The volume, finishes and color,” said fellow artist, Galo Coca.
After an assessment to identify colors used on the facades above, it was found that in several works the original colors were dropped. Therefore, based on historical references “we know that the architecture of that time was not white, has never been white. In fact they were quite vivid, bright colors, and some were worked with local minerals, which were used as input for the preparation of these paintings.”
Thus, for historical references, it was decided to use the red indian, “which is one of the many colors it might have had the building.”
This possibility varies according to the different trends that were happening over time, but like many buildings in the central village, there is evidence of such changes in color, original trend that has been recovered.
Teresa Adriazola curator who works at the museum in colonial painting has in her workshop with a range of pigments developed and manufactured specifically for conservation and restoration of works of that time. This scale was a base for painting. “I have a sampler with oxides, vegetable, animal origin and natural colors. Then we did a search of the colors that should be used in such buildings,” she said.
The implementation was based on research done by the architect Luis Prado, with jobs in Potosi; Elizabeth Torres as well in Sucre. “It’s a rescue color, basically, because this is to see the colonial buildings white is part of the imaginary. When people see, as in this case, the facade of another color there is a rejection, but we know that historically these buildings were painted, they were very colorful on the outside and very colorful inside, because in mural painting interior existed in the environment and social areas. ”
The mestizo baroque architecture is characterized by having a very striking polychrome colors, “on”, which were part of the aesthetic of the time.
Curiosity in people, mainly elderly, about the change in the facade of the museum, was made available to visitors two reference publications that talk about architecture of that era.
50 years will be the MNA in 2016. It is expected to reopen in the first quarter of next year.
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