On the right bank of the Rhone River in the Provence town of Arles, the Harpist’s House built in Rome is known as an extraordinary record of ancient architecture and interior decoration.
Now, the experts have opened their studios, demonstrating their painstaking attempts to piece together magnificent huge puzzles. The unprecedented murals found on this land are believed to date back more than two thousand years.
Since April, experts have been selecting 800 fragments of murals, some of which were taken from the excavated walls of the building, and some were found in the ruins. The first batch of images is being displayed in a temporary exhibition at the Arles Museum, but experts say that it will not be possible to reassemble all the murals covering an area of more than 220 square meters until at least 2023.
These fragments, some of which are almost larger than nails, have been cleaned, labelled and put in a box so that they can be checked one by one to see if they might fit a larger picture. So far, experts have spent a total of 1,800 hours to select these fragments.
Ancient mural expert Julien Boislève said: “We estimate that each case will take us one day, so it will take about 1,000 days to study all these cases.” “It’s like a puzzle… Of course, we There are no original models or all the fragments, which means it is a tedious job. This is a major task, but we are lucky to have a lot of high-quality decorations, which is very rare.”
The Harp House was built between 70 BC and 50 BC. It was built by Italian craftsmen around the central atrium, which has a large pool to collect rainwater for the family.
It is believed that it was deliberately destroyed less than 20 years later, and a new property was built on the ruins to preserve the artwork. In successive periods, three houses were built on the site. The first excavation took place in 2013.
Marie-Pierre Rothé, an archaeologist at the Arles Museum, said: “At this time, the site has been abandoned for about 30 years, but we would like to know what is under this property and whether There are older professions.”
A camera probe more than one meter below the existing building shows the Harper’s House, named after a figure in one of the earliest reconstructed murals.
“We saw the walls and the extraordinary paintings. It was so exciting. In addition to paintings, we have many discoveries from this period. These are very clean, and the colors are still bright, in an extraordinary state of protection,” Rothé Added.
The archaeologist focused on two rooms in the late buildings of Pompeii and spent four years excavating frescoes and collecting fragments, which she called “a difficult task.”
The wall of one of the villa rooms seems to be lined with galleries of great figures, including the harpist and pedestal, and stands out from the vermilion background.
Experts say that the decoration of characters and large-size images are called giant paintings, Found in Italy, but unknown FranceThe diversity and excellent quality of the decorations give people a unique understanding of the late Roman decoration patterns, especially the frescoes of the late Pompeii.
Boislève said that he hopes that these frescoes will eventually be displayed as part of the reconstruction of the Roman room, as a permanent exhibition in the Arles Museum.
“These things are usually hung on the wall, but we hope that these extraordinary paintings, which are examples of interior decoration, can be displayed in their architectural environment,” he said.
