Factum Arte and Simon Starling have been working together in preparation for Starling’s exhibition celebrating the life and works of 19th century German realist painter, Adolph Menzel (1815-1905). The exhibition, ‘The Pencil of Menzel & the Path on the Wolf’ (neugerriemschneider, Berlin, 03 July – 28 August 2021), saught to celebrate Menzel’s ability to liberate works of their static compositions, embodying physicality, and movement to create a whole new dimension to his 19th century scenes and cityscapes.

Digitally transformed rematerialisations of two of Menzel’s prominent works housed at the Kunstmuseum Wintherthur in Switzerland were produced at Factum Arte´s studio in Madrid after recording them in high resolution.

The paintings Berlin Tenements in the Snow (1847-1848) and The Anhalter Railway Station by Moonlight (1846) underwent a two-stage scanning process devised by Factum’s team. The surface was recorded using Factum’s Lucida 3D Scanner to achieve the correct shape and relief texture. Composite photography was used to obtain the accurate colour recordings in ultra-high resolution to preserve the painting´s detail during the enlargement process.

Starling wished to reconstruct Menzel’s artworks whilst simultaneously celebrating the images as they were intended to be and as they currently exist. Both works were processed individually. The Berlin Tenements in the Snow (1847-1848) models were scaled and edited to 10x the painting's original size, as requested by the artist, and edited to ensure the surface details remained intact during the resizing process.

The Anhalter Railway Station by Moonlight (1846) colour and surface elements were inverted, and the colour edited to represent only amounts of light in varying degrees of grey and black.

To achieve the surface depth required for the 10:1 scaled Berlin Tenements in the Snow, the surface was CNC milled in high-density polyurethane. Once the milling was complete, the hard surface was gesso coated to prime it and prepare it for direct colour printing on Factum Arte´s flatbed printer.

Given the low relief of the Menzel´s Anhalter Railway Station by Moonlight, the two 1:1 scale rematerialisations followed a distinct process. The models of the depth map were printed on an Elevated Printing system (by Canon Production Printing). From this elevated print, a silicone mould was cast in a gesso-based 'skin', finely indented with the surface. The colour was then registered to the gesso skin with the help of an acetate sheet and then printed on Factum´s flatbed printer. 

---