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May 2019 - present
November 2017 - present
April 2013 - March 2019
Publications
Publications (57)
It is well-known that all the phases of the manufacturing influence the extraordinary aesthetic and acoustic features of Stradivari's instruments. However, these masterpieces still keep some of their secrets hidden by the lack of documentary evidence. In particular, there is not a general consensus on the use of a protein-based ground coating direc...
In this work, one of the two existing mandolins made by Antonio Stradivari has been investigated for the first time, as a rare exemplar of the lesser-known class of plucked string instruments. The mandolin was studied by non-invasive reflection Fourier transformed infrared (FT-IR) spectroscopy and X-ray fluorescence (XRF) on different areas previou...
Modification of IR spectral features were reported in the literature when surfaces with diverse morphologies were analysed. In this study, five surfaces at different average roughness (Sa) were created on a massive slice of malachite with the final aim to investigate possible variations of spectral features collected through non-contact infrared re...
The conservation process of historical musical instruments involves lots of different issues because, in most cases, musical instruments are played. One of the most frequent and delicate procedures for their preservation is to remove soil and dust that have been accumulated on the instruments surface. For the first time, bio-polymer gels made of Al...
In the present work, we had the opportunity to study the coating systems of three different coeval violins, namely “Spagnoletti”, “Stauffer”, and “Principe Doria”, made by Giuseppe Guarneri “del Gesù” in 1734. These three violins were non-invasively investigated by reflection Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and X-ray fluorescence. These two...
p class="Abstract">The investigation of the coating systems used on historical bowed string musical instruments is generally highly complex due to the coatings’ reduced thickness and multi-layered structure. Furthermore, sampling is rarely feasible, and non-invasive approaches do not always allow researchers to undertake a thorough characterisation...
Restoration and conservation procedures for historical musical instruments involve several issues, also connected with their frequent being played. One of the most delicate procedures for their preservation is the cleaning of surfaces from soil and dirt which have accumulated over the years. In fact, when external particles reach the surface, a fra...
Wooden artefacts embrace wide-ranging types of objects, like paintings on panel, sculptures, musical instruments, and furniture. Generally, in the manufacturing process of an artwork, wood is firstly treated with organic and inorganic materials to make it nonporous and morphologically homogeneous, and, at last, the surface treatment consists of var...
A micro-sample detached from a historical bowed string instrument represents a valuable record of the materials used by the great Masters of violin-making art. It allows researchers to collect a wealth of information and to disclose - at least partially - their procedures for finishing and varnishing.
In the present work, a set of four cross-sectio...
The coating system of bowed string instruments is often composed of several
organic (e.g. siccative oils, resins) and inorganic (e.g. pigments, fillers)
materials, variously mixed and/or overlaid. In two recent scientific studies
performed by the Arvedi Laboratory of Non-Invasive Diagnostics, six large
fragments removed from musical instruments dur...
Soiling deposition and wrong conservation practices are among the causes of the decay process that can affect the morphological, mechanical, and compositional features of the varnish, the most exposed layer of an artefact. In this perspective, the identification of the best cleaning practices is a priority. During the 18th century, scientific instr...
The back plates of master violins at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford and the Museo del Violino in Cremona were analyzed by portable magnetic resonance imaging with the NMR-MOUSE in terms of depth profiles. Distributions of transverse NMR relaxation times were recorded versus depth at points of small curvature across the violin back plates providing...
It is generally believed that the modern violin has emerged in Italy in the first half of the 16th century. The scientific study of its complex stratigraphy began approximately in the 1980's with invasive standard methods. Only since the last decade or so, the focus of diagnostic investigations has been increasingly shifted towards the use of non-i...
One of the most hotly debated subjects in lutherie circles is the composition of the finishing layers applied by the violinmakers of the past on their valuable bowed string instruments. These are often composed of several organic and inorganic materials, variously mixed and overlaid. During the last decade many analytical strategies were put in pla...
The intrinsic complexity of the coating systems on historical bowed string musical instruments complicates the characterization of the different materials that have been subsequently spread on the wood. Even more challenging is the identification of their spatial distribution in the sequence of the finishing layers. To face both issues, in this stu...
Over the recent decades, the identification of scientific instruments as cultural heritage has drawn attention to their preservation, and today a lack of knowledge about this topic is drastically evident. Varnishes used during the 18 th century in Europe and applied as a protective layer on brass components were known as imitation of Chinese lacque...
Stylistic analysis of artworks is an important practice in the field of Cultural Heritage. Over time, significant stylistic characteristics have been identified for paintings and sculptures, but not for historical musical instruments. Even if various stylistic features of instruments are well known, their importance for attributing an instrument to...
Material characterization of two precious but highly damaged brass horns from the 17th century held in the Castello Sforzesco Museum in Milan. Augmented reality application is proposed for the museum exhibition with the results of the scientific investigation.
Historic musical instruments, especially violins, have witnessed centuries of stories and events, passing from hand to hand among musicians, collectors and restorers. Historical last wills and trading documents makes it possible to reconstruct the movements around the world of the decorated ex-San Lorenzo violin and its story throughout its owners....
Musical instruments are tools for playing music, but for some of them-made by the most important historical violin makers-the myths hide the physical artwork. Ancient violin-making Masters developed peculiar construction methods and defined aesthetic canons that are still recognizable in their musical instruments. Recently, the focus of scientific...
This study presents mid and near-infrared (7500-375 cm ⁻¹ ) total reflection mode spectra of several natural organic materials used in artworks as binding media, consolidants, adhesives, or protective coatings. A novel approach to describe and interpret reflectance bands as well as calculated absorbance after Kramers-Kronig transformation (KKT) is...
Historical musical instruments represent a particular class of artworks: some of them are preserved in museums, but can also be played regularly.The aim of this study is to provide a procedure to assess the risk of damage for the instruments as well as to evaluate the impact of the performance on their conservation status. For this purpose, a monit...
The Cultural Heritage preservation, by means of preventive actions aimed to reduce the risk of deterioration and to protect the constituent materials, implicates several difficulties for the conservators. The musical instruments can represent a particular class of artworks, because their conservation is not limited to the material preservation, but...
In the Cultural Heritage field, stratigraphic analysis is commonly carried out by applying microscopic and micro-analytical techniques to cross-sections of micro-samples taken from artwork. This methodology provides the most comprehensive information on the object's physical structure, but necessarily implies the loss of precious or unique fragment...
The presentation deals with a multi-analytical study made on the "Tuscan" violin (1690) by Antonio Stradivari. The results from this violin, which is extremely important for its construction technique as well as its excellent state of preservation, have been also compared with the data collected on other numerous Stradivari musical instruments.
During recent decades, many researchers have tried to understand the main influences on the extraordinary sound and beauty of the masterpieces made by the ancient violin makers. This is still a challenge for many others today. Mainly because of a lack of written historical documents, the rediscovery of some of the ancient violin-making processes wa...
The history of bowed string instruments includes centuries of experimentation performed by violin makers with different manufacturing processes and several natural materials. The characterization of the material components can therefore often help researchers to identify the construction period of an instrument, its geographical origins or, if poss...
Abstract Preventive actions have increasingly been playing an important role over time in the Cultural Heritage Conservation. The aim of this practice is to reduce the risk of artworks’ deterioration and to slow down the natural ageing of materials. The case of musical instruments is generally more complex since it deals with both the material pres...
Preventive actions have increasingly been playing an important role over time in the Cultural Heritage Conservation. The aim of this practice is to reduce the risk of artworks’ deterioration and to slow down the natural ageing of materials. The case of musical instruments is generally more complex since it deals with both the material
preservation...
In the Cultural Heritage field, the stratigraphic analysis is carried out through the study of cross-sections [1]. This methodology is fundamental to discriminate the different layers composing a work of art, but it necessarily implies invasive sampling or micro-sampling with the consequent loss of precious or unique fragments. For this reason, the...
The analysis of historical musical instruments is becoming more relevant and the interest is increasingly moving toward the non-invasive reflection FTIR spectroscopy, especially for the analysis of varnishes. In this work, a specific infrared reflectance spectral library of organic compounds was created with the aim of identifying musical instrumen...
In recent years, UV-induced fluorescence (UVIFL) photography has proven to be very effective when studying the surface of historical musical instruments, such as violins. This technique makes it possible to highlight superficial details not clearly perceptible with visible light (e.g., retouchings, superficial distribution of varnishes, or wear). T...
Assessing the tonal qualities of an acoustic musical instrument is a challenge that has long been pursued by researchers in musical acoustics. This is a topic of particular interest when it comes to discussing the case of violins. Historical violins are often believed to owe a great deal of their celebrated timbral qualities to the choice and the m...
In the past, the practice of dyeing wood was very widespread, for instance for obtaining substitutes for rare and expensive ebony, which was used for all marquetry techniques and especially for making inlays to decorate musical instruments. This study focuses on two traditional wood-dyeing procedures carried out with iron–gall dye and iron–logwood...
L’articolo illustra alcune delle attività di ricerca e dei metodi sviluppati presso il Laboratorio Arvedi di Diagnostica non Invasiva per lo studio degli strumenti musicali antichi, con particolare interesse agli strumenti ad arco. Le opere di celebri liutai quali Stradivari, Amati e Guarneri, attualmente ospitati all’interno del Museo del Violino...
The study and characterization of the materials of historic musical instruments, especially violins, represent an important aim for scientists and conservators. Particularly, the varnishes have been often investigated, even to correlate their chemical characteristics with the sound produced by instruments. However, in the last years, the attention...
UV fluorescence photography is widely use in the study of
artworks, in particular for the analysis of historical musical instruments.
This technique allows seeing important details which cannot be observed
with visible light, such as retouching, different paints coats or worn areas.
The complexity of the interpretation of the surface of a violin is...
The selection of representative areas to be analyzed is a common problem in the study of Cultural Heritage items. UV fluorescence photography is an extensively used technique to highlight specific surface features which cannot be observed in visible light (e.g. restored parts or treated with different materials), and it proves to be very effective...
Since the earliest periods of musical instrument making, the decoration of the violins with different techniques has had an important influence on the aesthetic characteristics and consequently the prestige and the worth of an instrument. Antonio Stradivari realized several stringed and plucked instruments decorated with various techniques: inlay,...
The most important collection of the Antonio Stradivari finds, which includes paper and wooden molds, drawings, annotations, wooden forms and tools, are preserved in the Museo del Violino of Cremona. These finds represent a precious historic heritage since they contain indications and technical notes of the great luthier and provides organologic cl...
Here we report on a chemical study carried out on a set of 21 coloured vitreous mosaic tesserae, dating back to the 2nd century CE, collected from the Roman archaeological site of Villa dei Quintili in Rome (Italy),. The chemical analyses were performed on all vitreous tesserae by a Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscopy equipped with an Energ...
In recent years there has been growing interest in the area of musical instruments, stimulated by the marked rise in market values. In particular, most of the economic investments are focused on violins. Their economic value is due to many factors such as their history, the intangible value of their sound, and the myths associated with the greatest...
Several glass mosaic tesserae were recovered during the archeological excavation of the thermal baths at the ‘Villa dei Quintili’ in Rome and dated to the second century AD. This work reports the results of an archeometrical investigation performed, through a multi-technique approach, on 19 colored opaque tesserae. The aims of the study were (1) th...
The results of a Micro-Raman spectroscopy investigation performed on twenty-one Roman glass mosaic tesserae (II century A.D.), from the “Villa dei Quintili” excavation in Rome, are reported. The set of tesserae was retrieved in the thermal baths and covers the majority of the colour palette of that time. The aim was to identify the raw materials, t...