Madrid: Professional restorers in Spain are demanding to know how the refurbishment of a historic church was apparently botched to leave it looking crude and cartoonish.
One group of conservationists called the work on the 18th-century Ermita de Nuestra Señora del Mirón in Soria in northern Spain as amateurish and an “attack” on Spain’s heritage.
Professional restorers have described the refurbishment as crude and cartoonish.Credit: @soriapatrimonio
Before-and-after pictures of the makeover show the church’s once white nave now striped strawberry red and its prized cherubs painted in stark colours, looking startled.
“What have they done to the Ermita de Nuestra Señora del Mirón?” local cultural conservation group Soria Patrimonio wrote on X.
The church is listed as a heritage building and famous among fans of the Spanish poet Antonio Machado, who visited the church often when his wife, Leonor Izquierdo, fell ill before her death in Soria in 1912.
Soria Patrimonio said: “It is a listed building, and even if it were not, the intervention in a monument of these characteristics must have minimum guarantees.
The interior of the church before and then after the restoration.
“Repainting was not a valid option and much less so in a way that turns what was unique into vulgar.”
The Association of Conservators-Restorers of Spain (Acre) described the restoration of the church as an “attack” on heritage, performed, it said, “without professionals, without respect and without criteria”.
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