Daniele da Volterra’s busts of Michelangelo

The exhibition ‘The Bronze Effigy of Michelangelo by Daniele da Volterra’ (15 February – 31 July, 2022), curated by Cecilie Hollberg at the Gallerie dell’Accademia in Florence, reunited for the first time nine bronze busts from various collections around the world. Direct comparison has revealed both similarities and differences, and much debate still surrounds the ‘genealogy’ between the different casts.

Each of the busts was recorded by Factum Foundation’s experts using strictly non-contact technologies: a structured white light scanner (Breuckmann Smartscan3D-HE) and photogrammetry. The use of both techniques, even on shiny surfaces such as bronze, is capable of obtaining an extremely accurate relief of the surfaces once the two sets of data have been combined into a 3D model using specialised software.

The first busts to be digitised were those in Florence (Gallerie dell’Accademia, Casa Buonarroti and Museo del Bargello), followed by those in the collections of the Museo della Città “Luigi Tonini” in Rimini, the Castello Sforzesco in Milan and the Musei Capitolini in Rome; the team then worked on the busts in the Musée Jacquemart-André and the Louvre in Paris, finishing with the one in the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford. Coordination and collaboration with the respective institutions enabled the work to be completed in just over two weeks. In January 2022, the bust inside the Musée Bonnat in Bayonne was also added to the recordings.

During several months of work with Cecilie Hollberg (Gallerie dell’Accademia) and Mario Micheli (Università Roma 3) in the studios of Factum Foundation in Madrid, the busts were digitally “mapped” in their key points and correspondences, overlaid and compared in a unique research work that combined for the first time digital expertise with academic rigour to help identify the original busts in Daniele da Volterra’s studio, and the “genealogy” of the other variants.The high-resolution 3D models were then printed at 1/3 of the original and life-size, to allow for comparisons prior to viewing the original busts inside the Gallerie dell’Accademia. Both 3D printed versions, together with the digital data, are on display in the exhibition. In addition, 3D models can also serve as a valuable ‘snapshot’ of the surface conservation condition of the work, and the digital data remains property of the respective institutions for all uses – in line with Factum Foundation’s core missions.

‘Michelangelo: l’effigie in bronzo di Daniele da Volterra’
Research day, March 21st, 2022
Galleria dell’Accademia, Florence

Adam Lowe and Voula Paraskevi Natsi were invited to participate in the research day preceding the publication of the exhibition catalogue.