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Spain has (yet another) new botched restoration

A well-meaning parishioner has become the latest Spaniard to make headlines with a botched restoration job after sprucing up wooden carvings in her local church.

Published: 7 September 2018 11:26 CEST
Spain has (yet another) new botched restoration
The new-look statue of Mary in Rañadoiro an Asturian hamlet near Tineo.

The as yet unnamed resident in the hamlet of Rañadoiro in Spain’s northern region of Asturias chose to paint three wooden carvings – apparently dating from the 15th and 16th centuries – with bright colours.

And bright colours they truly are.

One previously austere plain wooden statue has now been transformed into something that wouldn't look out of place at Disneyland.

Virgin Mary has discarded her usual sombre blue tones for a fuchsia pink headscarf and lipstick to match, while the young Jesus appears in robes of bright green – the colour of Kermit the Frog.  


Before and After: Statue of the Virgin and Child with Santa Ana.

In another statue, the Virgin Mary has been given a makeover to appear more like Barbie, with blonde curls and batted eyelashes adorned in pastel pink and sky blue robes, while her peachy babe-in-arms is clad in warm pink.  


Before and after: The virgin and Child

“I’m not a professional, but the figures were just horrible and I thought a bit of colour would improve him,” the woman, who is one of only 17 residents in the village, told local media.

She reportedly was granted permission from the parish priest to remove the icons from the church before taking them for a lick of paint.

Church authorities have apparently been dispatched to the chapel to survey the damage, according to  La Voz de Asturias.

The latest amateur artist follows in the footsteps of the now infamous Cecilia Giménez, the octogenarian who put the small Aragon town of Borja on the map with her disastrous but highly comical attempt to revamp the local chapel's Ecce Homo in 2012. 

Reluctantly the most famous living artist in Spain she changed the fortunes of the town drawing tens of thousands of visitors to marvel at her artwork and has even inspired an opera.

Earlier this summer, another attempt at statue restoration, this time in Navarra, brought public ridicule, and outrage from heritage experts when a 500-year-old image of Saint George was given a “Tintin” face.

St George or Tintin? The best memes of Spain's latest botched restoration.

 

ART

African-born director’s new vision for Berlin cultural magnet

One of the rare African-born figures to head a German cultural institution, Bonaventure Ndikung is aiming to highlight post-colonial multiculturalism at a Berlin arts centre with its roots in Western hegemony.

Published: 8 July 2023 10:13 CEST
African-born director's new vision for Berlin cultural magnet

The “Haus der Kulturen der Welt” (House of World Cultures), or HKW, was built by the Americans in 1956 during the Cold War for propaganda purposes, at a time when Germany was still divided.

New director Ndikung said it had been located “strategically” so that people on the other side of the Berlin Wall, in the then-communist East, could see it.

This was “representing freedom” but “from the Western perspective”, the 46-year-old told AFP.

Now Ndikung, born in Cameroon before coming to study in Germany 26 years ago, wants to transform it into a place filled with “different cultures of the world”.

The centre, by the river Spree, is known locally as the “pregnant oyster” due to its sweeping, curved roof. It does not have its own collections but is home to exhibition rooms and a 1,000-seat auditorium.

It reopened in June after renovations, and Ndikung’s first project “Quilombismo” fits in with his aims of expanding the centre’s offerings.

The exhibition takes its name from the Brazilian term “Quilombo”, referring to the communities formed in the 17th century by African slaves, who fled to remote parts of the South American country.

Throughout the summer, there will also be performances, concerts, films, discussions and an exhibition of contemporary art from post-colonial societies across Africa, the Americas, Asia and Oceania.

‘Rethink the space’

“We have been trying to… rethink the space. We invited artists to paint walls… even the floor,” Ndikung said.

And part of the “Quilombismo” exhibition can be found glued to the floor -African braids laced together, a symbol of liberation for black people, which was created by Zimbabwean artist Nontsikelelo Mutiti.

According to Ndikung, African slaves on plantations sometimes plaited their hair in certain ways as a kind of coded message to those seeking to escape, showing them which direction to head.

READ ALSO: Germany hands back looted artefacts to Nigeria

His quest for aestheticism is reflected in his appearance: with a colourful suit and headgear, as well as huge rings on his fingers, he rarely goes unnoticed.

During his interview with AFP, Ndikung was wearing a green scarf and cap, a blue-ish jacket and big, sky-blue shoes.

With a doctorate in medical biology, he used to work as an engineer before devoting himself to art.

In 2010, he founded the Savvy Gallery in Berlin, bringing together art from the West and elsewhere, and in 2017 was one of the curators of Documenta, a prestigious contemporary art event in the German city of Kassel.

Convinced of the belief that history “has been written by a particular type of people, mostly white and men,” Ndikung has had all the rooms in the HKW renamed after women.

These are figures who have “done something important in the advancement of the world” but were “erased” from history, he added. Among them is Frenchwoman Paulette Nardal, born in Martinique in 1896.

She helped inspire the creation of the “negritude” movement, which aimed to develop black literary consciousness, and was the first black woman to study at the Sorbonne in Paris.

Reassessing history

Ndikung’s appointment at the HKW comes as awareness grows in Germany about its colonial past, which has long been overshadowed by the atrocities committed during the era of Adolf Hitler’s Nazis.

Berlin has in recent years started returning looted objects to African countries which it occupied in the early 20th century — Burundi, Rwanda, Tanzania, Namibia and Cameroon.

“It’s long overdue,” said Ndikung.

He was born in Cameroon’s capital, Yaounde, into an anglophone family.

The country is majority francophone but also home to an anglophone minority and has faced deadly unrest in English-speaking areas, where armed insurgents are fighting to establish an independent homeland.

One of his dreams is to open a museum in Cameroon “bringing together historical and contemporary objects” from different countries, he said.

He would love to locate it in Bamenda, the capital of Cameroon’s restive Northwest region.

“But there is a war in Bamenda, so I can’t,” he says.

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