Farewell to Pinin Brambilla Barcilon, the restorer of Leonardo's Last Supper

Restorer Pinin Brambilla Barcilon, one of the great names in 20th-century restoration, world-famous for directing the long and complicated restoration of Leonardo da Vinci ’sLast Supper in Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan, passed away last Saturday, Dec. 12, in Milan. Announcing her passing was the Centro per la Conservazione e il Restauro “La Venaria Reale,” one of Italy’s leading restoration hubs, which she founded and directed until 2012.

Pinin Brambilla Barcilon was born in Monza in 1925 and specialized in the restoration of works by Renaissance masters: during her career she worked for the Ministry of Cultural Heritage, the Louvre, and the Catalan Museum of Art in Barcelona. Her résumé includes work on Giotto ’s frescoes in the Scrovegni Chapel, on those of Masolino in the Baptistery of Castiglione Olona, and then again on works by artists such as Piero della Francesca, Andrea Mantegna, Carlo Crivelli, Filippino Lippi, Gentile Bellini, Lorenzo Lotto, Caravaggio, Titian, Giambattista Tiepolo, and even modern authors such as Lucio Fontana and Man Ray. Between 1970 and 1990 she was a member of the Italian committee of ICOM - International Council of Museums, and in 2019 she was also a member of the MiBACT committee for the celebrations of the 500th anniversary of Leonardo’s death. Just in 2019 she had received an honorary degree in Conservation and Restoration of Cultural Heritage from the University of Turin.

His name, however, remains inextricably linked to Leonardo’s Last Supper: it bears his signature the long intervention (from 1978 to 1999) that managed to “save” theLast Supper by stopping the deterioration of the original paintings, and around which there was no shortage of controversy (American art historian James Beck, for example, called it “a useless restoration,” which in his opinion had caused the loss of the history of the Last Supper). Pinin Brambilla was defended, however, by Renzo Zorzi, then director of Olivetti who provided the funds for the operation, and by Carlo Bertelli who held the position of superintendent of Milan (for him, Pinin Brambilla was “exposed to arrows like a Saint Sebastian”). The story of the restoration was later told in a well-known book, My Life with Leonardo, published by Mondadori Electa in 2015.

“There are not many words to say goodbye to such an important figure for our Center,” comments the Center for Conservation and Restoration “La Venaria Reale,” “for all of us and for the entire restoration world. His rigor and example will remain a point of reference, which will live on in our choices and actions. Bye Pinin, we will miss you.”

Farewell to Pinin Brambilla Barcilon, the restorer of Leonardo's Last Supper

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