The statue of the Greek god, located in La Granja, has already re-implanted his finger after a citizen returned it
Reconstructive surgery also makes re-implantations in the art world. Apollo bears witness. A sculpture of the Greek god, located in the Palacio de la Granja de San Ildefonso (Segovia), is on display showing his five fingers. Previously, he didn’t have them because he was missing the little finger on his left hand, which disappeared in the 1980s. After a citizen returned it immaculate in a small box months ago, the marble phalanx has been reintroduced into the figure, owned by National Heritage.
Apolo won’t let his rings fall, but if he wanted to, he could now wear them on all his fingers. The previously slightly crippled sculpture, executed by Francesco Maria Nocchieri in the 17th century, is now complete in all its evocative physicality thanks to a careful restoration.
The piece was not the victim of vandals but has certainly deteriorated over time. Despite what it may seem, marble is more fragile than it appears, especially if it has been exposed, as is the case, outdoors.
After a painstaking restoration process, which involved cleaning the finger, reintegrating it with hand putty and coloring it, a task that Ana María Loureiro has been in charge of, Apolo looks like the almighty god he is with his new little finger. If he was left-handed, he could even play the lyre, an instrument with which the son of Zeus appears, although he does not need it. For something, Olympus is populated by all-powerful beings.
The return of the lost finger took place in Aranjuez, in whose Royal Palace it stayed for a long time, until the statue was transferred to La Granja at the beginning of this century. When Nilo Fernández, the National Heritage Delegate at the royal site, saw the finger, he was a little worried. “It’s life-size, which causes a little bit of dirt. It’s a little bigger than a human finger and it’s cut so well, it’s got that white color, it looks like it’s been torn off. It has a very human bill,” says Fernández .
Before cleaning and fixing the little finger to the hand, it was necessary to verify that the fragment in question was of the same stone. After the restorers established the origin of the phalanx, they glued it together. «In all those stones that break or break, the union is never quite exact, because there are pieces that become or break off sandstone. It is a delicate operation that must be performed with precision so that the tear is seen as little as possible. The restoration team has done a great job,” says Nilo Fernández.
Now that Apollo has his finger back, there’s one more lookalike that still remains mutilated. And it is that when the sculpture changed location in the year 2000, it was decided that Aranjuez would not remain orphaned by the Apollonian beauty. It was then that a replica was created that, in accordance with the times, was devoid of the left little finger. The father of this somewhat crippled and now in rosy health Apollo, Nocchieri, learned the art of sculpture in Bernini’s studio. Protected by Queen Christina of Sweden, he carried out his work between 1684 and 1686 to complete a series of Roman sculptures of muses found at Villa Adriana. He was at the Riario Palace in Rome, the residence of the Swedish Queen. The sculptures were grouped and presided over by Apollo, in a room reminiscent of Parnassus.
Then the work gave a lot of bumps. In 1724, King Felipe V and Isabel de Farnesio acquired the collection for their palace in Granja de San Ildefonso. But Carlos IV had the Apollo brought to Aranjuez in 1789 to place it in a fountain in the Jardín del Príncipe, completed in 1827.
It remained in Aranjuez until the year 2000, when it returned to the Segovian Palace for the reorganization and restoration of the museum. It is now displayed in the center of the wall of the Sala de la Fuente in the Palacio de la Granja.
Source: La Verdad
I’m Wayne Wickman, a professional journalist and author for Today Times Live. My specialty is covering global news and current events, offering readers a unique perspective on the world’s most pressing issues. I’m passionate about storytelling and helping people stay informed on the goings-on of our planet.
