In the previous two articles, here and here, I explained that the eight statues we've taken down from the Minervalaan 28-30 arrived in a very battered state. There ware several serious fractions and sometimes quite a loss of detail.
In addition, in the distant past they had already been repaired with a very hard mortar, which had started to detach from the surface in many places. The multiple paint layers didn't help this either. Time to repair them and make a reconstruction before we were going to carve the copies.
← Detail of the image Winter. Old repairs and rusty iron staples are clearly visible on the eroded pieces of of its surface.
Glue-up
In particular the right hand Faun, the lady of Autumn and the Diggin Man of Winter came down in several pieces. Pressure from the building that rested on it and seeping rainwater will probably be to blame for this.
Because these sculptures are not going to be restored, but will be copied, glue-up was not a complicated matter in this case. Just gather up all the pieces, find out how they fit, fill the fracture surfaces with glue, and clamp them right up.
Moisture transport
Now this is not something you can do anywhere. Suppose a sculpture is to be reinstalled in an outdoor environment, then you'll be dealing with moisture penetrating it. That moisture will eventually have to come out again, and it will follow a transport process from top to bottom and from the inside to the outside. Should it encounter a full dense glue layer on that journey, then problems will be guaranteed.
Over a horizontal glue surface, for example, the moisture above the glue will remain within the stone for a long time, and it's difficult to get it out sideways. The result will be a strong deterioration of the stone above the glue layer, especially in a frost period after a wet fall or winter. So what we have done here with saturated glue surfaces was only possible because these sculptures are no longer placed outside.
Old repairs
After the bonding we started looking for the original shapes of the sculptures. In some cases this meant that we had to remove large chunks of old repairs. Sometimes too much material had been applied, which particularly ended up making legs too plump, with thick edema ankles. Not all repairs have been removed; we also counted on it that we would be carving a lot of details in the major volumes later on, in the phase of sculpting in the new stone.
If you'd remove all repairs, that would also mean a loss of information, all the more so since it irrevocably comes off only while taking a layer of the original sculpture with it. The underlying stone is much softer than the tough cement repairs that were often very much stuck onto it.
Shedding its skin
Not all repairs were stuck on that much. Due to this barely permeable repair layer, and especially in combination with that dense layer of latex paint, moisture was building up within the underlying tuff. As mentioned in the previous post, there was a rainpipe hidden in the facade on the right façade corner, which dripped its moisture into the statuettes for years.
The result was rich algae bloom, peeling skin of the statuettes, and, in the case of the Man Sowing, a total crumbling of the surface. I already mentioned that for this reason recovery was no longer a solution. The repairs would one day, in the future, just come back down, underlying stone and all.
Photographic material
For carving a good reconstruction in new stone, it was necessary to have usable models, based on the old statuettes. In this case we repaired the sculptures with a soft type of plaster. For this, I first collected as much photo material as possible, in particular from the sculptures on the other side of the street, which were in a much better state. A year and a half earlier I'd also taken a lot of photos of the views of each statue : from the left, left front, front view, front right, and right.
I first printed and laminated these photos on A3 format, but those big prints were very awkward to handle. I discovered that a small book with all views in size A5 was much more convenient: because you can quickly browse through those. Ideally, these booklets would be printed on plastic, so that they wouldn't be susceptible to moisture and rain, But luckily paper also worked.
Who does what?
Jelle and I took on the reconstruction of three statuettes each. Jelle the ladies from Spring and Summer and the left Faun with a goat, and I the Digging Man of Winter, the lady of Autumn and the right hand Faun with his deer. Tim enthusiastically started working on the old woman of Winter and the Sowing Man of Spring.
Plaster needs to set between the layers and we also needed time to assess the right shape, so this was work that we undertook in phases, sometimes in addition to other projects of sculpting at the same time.
Loss of information
During such a reconstruction you will always be faced with puzzle work when sculptures are so weathered. Details are no longer easy to trace back and you need to make choices. Which version is correct? That what we think to recognize here on this statue, or what is still visible on the other side of the street? It became clear that earlier restorers have not always known it either. Flat circles turned out to be the sunflowers of the Summer, and vague lines became ears of wheat or bunches of grapes.
We noticed that the four Muses of the seasons also depicted four phases of life: the young girl stands for Spring, the young woman for Summer, the mature woman for the Fall and the old woman for the Winter. Each had their own attibutes: flowers for Spring, ears of wheat and sunflowers for Summer, vines, grapes and apples for Autumn, and a cloak for Winter.
The lines of their hair also started to become much more defined as soon as we patched up the missing pieces: they continued into the facade.
Tim's Man Sowing
I've already mentioned it a few times before: the Man Sowing was the worst case. There was actually no recognizable detail anymore at all, and after dismantling even less was left of it
. Once crumbs are still hanging on with their last edge, just a touch would be enough to lose those as well. But we already knew that in advance, hence all those photos.
Now in addition to his work for me Tim also works as a volunteer at Museum De Dageraad, where everything can be found about the buildings of the Amsterdam School. And what do you know, he just happens to find the original plaster model of our missing sower hanging there, on the wall!
To make a long story short: he was allowed to borrow it for his reconstruction, and in return, he suggested that he would restore this plaster model (which he did beautifully and in a careful way!) and then, based on this plaster model, he was able to reconstruct the entire tuffstone Sower again .
The Man Digging
I myself had taken on the reconstruction of the Man Digging from Winter. He was missing his lower legs, the clogs and the shovel, and other details had become very unclear. However, the upper body was still so sharp that the original chisel strokes of Jaap Kaas still reappeared from under the thick paint layer.
This showed that the sculptor had finished his statuettes at the time with various chisels: the round chisel, the claw chisel and various flat chisels. This would give us guidance later during the sculpting in stone.
The Man Digging had something else that was unclear next to his shovel. It looked the most like a continuous beam with a jumble above it. After studying all the photos, I thought it could represent a bare tree, which is being planted by Man Digging.
Gallery: reconstruction of all figurines step by step
After this repair round an inspection followed. Once everything was approved, we went on to the next phase: carving them into new stone. Read more about this in the next blog post.
Well it's almost ready, the Dom Tower. And we have been working hard at it. As subcontractors of Slotboom Steenhouwers in Winterswijk we were asked to carry out a large part of the ornament work. The stonemasons took care of the complete measuring package, ordering the stone, consultation, 3D drawings, and cutting and carving the stonemasonry parts , and we were asked to sculpt the ornaments where there were still some square blocks left for us to carve.
Martijn, Martha, Jelle and Tim working in the cold of winter, in January 2024
We, that's first and foremost Jelle Steendam and myself, who started on this journey. Later also Nico Hogervorst and Tim Kaarsemaker joined in, and later on, Martha Onderwater and Martijn Linssen also assisted us temporarily.
Koen van Velzen copying a finial from the Dom Tower in Udelfanger sandstone
Caarying all the stuff up the narrow stairs
In 2019, when there was no complete scaffolding around the Dom Tower yet, Jelle and I both climbed the stairs with kilos of tools in order to carve a number of test ornaments in Monte Merlo trachyte, and in Peperino Grigio and in Ledesteen. To our delight, fortunately the decision was made to not have the ornaments carved in Peperino (way too dead looking) or in Ledesteen (“Stonemason's sorrow”, that's what I call it. Rock hard and glassy).
Why the need to restore it?
Well, you can have long meetings about that, but it just was necessary. I'll show you above. You don't even want to think about pieces falling from a height of over a hundred meters onto the people walking blow….
Three times on video
After a period of silence, our work started with carving huge finials in Portland stone. RTV Utrecht came to visit to record the first inspection round.
Later we were approached by the TV show InsideOut (Binnenste Buiten) of the KRO/NCRV, that ended up making an extensive report of our studio. Koen with the finials and crockets, Tim with a big block for the Dom Tower, Jelle with a family crest and Nico with two statues that he was restoring. We were very happy with the end result, that was a good portrayal of our work. A photo report has also been made, that you can find here at this link.
The Little Cloud Man
Finally, there was one more journalist from the newspaper Trouw. She came by because she was making a report about the restoration work on the Dom Tower (click on the images on the left to read a small part of it). Based on 1 block she highlighted the role of the architect, the contractor, the stonemasons and the sculptor in this project. My work naturally attracted attention again, because I'd inserted a little 'cloud man'’ in the pinnacle.
Where an ornament should have been, I used that space to hide tiny figurine. It's just a little thing, but of course it caused a bit of a stir. The idea behind it is that the tower can now defend itself. Anyone who criticizes this restoration of the Dom Tower can expect a snowball from above. I just didn't expect that this corner of this large block would exactly face the Town Hall… Please don't suspect me of ill intent.
We've made a lot of work for the Dom Tower in those five years, such as tiny finials and enormous crockets, gargoyles, ornaments on all kinds of pinnacle blocks, sometimes of nearly 800 kilos, and occasionally something other than ornaments. Very occasionally we were able to hide a little surprise among all the endlessly identical ornaments. That Little Cloud Man, a scene with wolves, little faces that lift a tip of the veil…
A Wolf Capital
Above is one of my very last blocks for the Dom Tower. It is a capital in Monte Merlo trachyte, a quite hard and brittle stone, and the tiny flowers are only a few centimeters tall.
But if you look closely, you can find a wolf on the right, and to his left a man with binoculars, a fat photographer and a woman with a shotgun, who threatens to shoot it. On the other side of the block we find someone with a protest sign (“Go Away Wolf”). But behind him, a wolf in a top hat is hiding, grinning.
You can see what you want in it, but I had- when I carved it- never thought it would become so connected to actual news, because the week after it was installed a wolf snatched a small dog from a hiker who had it on a leash, and a toddler got a warning nip from a nursing mother wolf. In the province of Utrecht, less than 15 kilometers from the Dom Tower. You can, if you look carefully with binoculars, find the blocks on the Zadelstraat side, at 20 meters up.
Architect Erik Jan Brans immortalized by sculptor Jelle Steendam on a capital on the Dom Tower
Jelle has incorporated the departing architect of the Dom Tower on his capital block, Erik Jan Brans. Architect Brans passed the baton in July 2023 to his successor Karlijn de Wild. With this, Jelle pays a small tribute to a modest, friendly person, on one of the last works in which he was intensively involved. There are also a few blocks with animal figures incorporated at approximately 6 meters up, on the Dom square side.
Gallery: Capitals and blind tracery Dom Tower
Apprentice project
Tim, Nico, Jelle, Martijn and Martha on the scaffolds of the Dom Tower
The work on the Dom Tower has gradually developed into a apprentice project. I started in 2019 started with colleagues Stide Vos, Serge van Druten and, in my workshop, Jelle Steendam. Later, Nico Hogervorst and Tim Kaarsemaker came to work for me, and later on Martha Onderwater and Martijn Linssen joined us for a shorter period, while Stide and Serge withdrew from work.
So now I was the only one of the 'old guard of the 90s', and hopes were pinned on the younger generation, as can be seen in the documentaries.
Martha Onderwater carving her first finial
Tim Kaarsemaker with his first finial
Jelle has stopped being an 'apprentice sculptor' for years’ now, he is a fully accomplished sculptor, and I am pleased that the profession is getting a good continuation with this batch. My dream is that there will be enough work for each of them with inspiring commissions. Not just restoration work, but especially new sculptures and reliefs of their own design, in stone and bronze, and probably also in other materials such as cast iron and ceramics. I just keep doing my thing, but I especially enjoy it when these newcomers to the profession push their boundaries and develop new skills in previously unexplored areas. The future belongs to the computer, or so it seems, but I hope with this blog, newspaper articles and video reports to convey that the human hand remains essential to maintain liveliness in carving.
