'Adam' Sculpture Returns To Metropolitan Museum Of Art After 12-Year Restoration Project
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- "Adam" is back at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
The late 15th Century marble sculpture by Renaissance artist Tullio Lombardo smashed to pieces when its pedestal collapsed on Oct. 6, 2002.
'Adam' Sculpture Returns To Metropolitan Museum Of Art After 12-Year Restoration Project
"He was on a plywood pedestal and that collapsed, it buckled underneath the weight of the sculpture," museum conservator Carolyn Riccardelli said in an 8-minute video released by the Met detailing the sculpture's restoration. "He's in about 28 major fragments, but there are hundreds of very small fragments and it was all saved."
The statue's head, face and torso were mostly unscathed, but the arms and legs were heavily damaged, CBS2's Elise Finch reported.
"For a piece that important to be damaged was something catastrophic," senior conservator Larry Becker said in the video. "A really high quality Renaissance sculpture outside of Italy is not common."
After undergoing a 12-year restoration project, the sculpture will be on display as part of the new exhibition, "Tullio Lombardo's Adam: A Masterpiece Restored."
It took a team of conservators, scientists, engineers and imaging experts nine years just to research the best way to restore the sculpture.
"We couldn't just do a standard treatment," said Riccardelli. "So we wanted to do research into the adhesives and pinning materials."
"Everything was rehearsed before, both virtually and actually using a mild model of all the major fragments," curator Luke Syson said.
If you look closely, you can still see evidence of the fall, especially along the left leg, Finch reported. Conservators said they aren't trying to hide that from people, but they did want to make the sculpture whole again.
"The sadness that we felt over the damage that this great piece of sculpture sustained is mitigated by the knowledge that we've put him back together again in such a way that the great artistry can be properly appreciated," Syson told 1010 WINS' Sonia Rincon.
The exhibition opens Tuesday and will run through July.
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