The following is an exchange between two art historians over the recen

The following is an exchange between two art historians over the recent
restoration of the Sistine Chapel.

Scholar A
I shudder to think what Michelangelo‘s reaction would be if he were to
gaze up today at the famous frescoes he painted on the ceiling of the
Sistine Chapel over four centuries ago. He was a practical man and would
not have been surprised by the effects of time and environment on his
masterpiece. He would have been philosophical about the damage
wrought by mineral salts left behind when rainwater leaked through the
roof. He would also probably have taken in stride the layers of dirt and
soot from the coal braziers that heated the chapel—if that dirt had not
been removed during the restoration.

Scholar B
The armament of the restorer is no longer limited to artistic sensibility
and historical knowledge. A chemist on the Vatican restoration team
identified the composition of the layers swathing Michelangelo‘s primary
hues. Since there was a stratum of dirt between the painting and the first
layer of glaze, it was clear that several decades had elapsed between the
completion of the ceiling and the application of the glaze. This justified
the use of cleaning solvents that would lift off all but that final layer of
dirt, which was kept for the sake of protection of the frescoes.

Scholar A
The Vatican restoration team revelled in inducing a colourful
transformation in the frescoes with their special cleaning solvents and
computerized analysis equipment. But he would have been appalled at
the ravages inflicted on his work by the restorers.
This effect was not, as they claim, achieved merely by removing the
dirt and animal glue (which was, by the way, employed by earlier
restorers to revive muted colours). They removed Michelangelo‘s final
touches as well. The ceiling no longer has its essential quality of
suppressed anger and thunderous pessimism. That quality was not an
artefact of grime, not a misleading monochrome imposed on the ceiling
by time. Michelangelo himself applied a veil of glaze to the frescoes to
darken them after he had deemed his work too bright. I think the master
would have felt compelled to add a few more layers of glaze had the
ceiling radiated forth as it does now. It is clear that the solvents of the
restorers did not just strip away the shadows. They also reacted
chemically with Michelangelo‘s pigments to produce hues the painter
himself never beheld.

Scholar B
The particular solvent they employed, AB 57, was chosen because of
the overall neutral action of its two chemicals on pigments: one
temporarily tones them down, but the other livens them up to the same
degree. Thus, the colours that emerged from the shadows are truly what
Michelangelo intended to be seen.
The luminous figures are without doubt the work of a master craftsman
who executed typical Renaissance painting techniques to perfection. This
is the source of the difficulty you have with the restoration: the ceiling of
the Sistine Chapel no longer seems to be the fruit of the wayward genius,
defiant of Renaissance fresco-painting protocol, that you always thought
Michelangelo was. You don‘t like the fact that the painter seems, like a
vagabond given a good scrubbing, to be a complete stranger, rational
and traditional and devoid of fearfulness and anger. But the veil that led
to the misperceptions of Michelangelo has now been lifted, and we may
better acquaint ourselves with him.

Scholar A
Of course, the restorers left open an avenue for the reversal of their own
―lifting of the veil.‖ Since the layers of animal glue are no longer there to
serve as protection, the atmospheric pollutants from the city of Rome
now have direct access to the frescoes. In fact, we‘ve already noticed
significant darkening in some of the restored work, and it‘s only been four
years since the restoration was completed. It remains to be seen whether
the measure introduced to arrest this process—an extensive climate
control system—will itself have any long-term effect on the chapel‘s
ceiling.

1. Scholar B‘s argument that the presence of dirt between the painting and the
first layer of glaze justified the use of cleaning solvents to remove the glaze
assumes that:
A. the dirt was laid down several decades after the painting‘s completion.
B. the cleaning solvents would never actually touch the frescoes.
C. Michelangelo intended the glaze to be relatively temporary.
D. Michelangelo could not have applied glaze to the ceiling decades after
painting it.
E. dirt is not actually making the painting look more beautiful


2. Based on Scholar B‘s claim that Scholar A is unhappy because the ceiling ―no
longer seems to be the fruit of [a] wayward genius, defiant of Renaissance painting protocol,‖ it is reasonable to conclude that:
A. Michelangelo was not a fiercely independent thinker.
B. the restoration has jeopardized Michelangelo‘s position in history as a
great artist.
C. darkening colours to produce a gloomy effect was characteristic of
Michelangelo‘s time.
D. historical conceptions of Michelangelo overestimated his negative
traits.
E. Scholar A is not aware of all the aspects of Michaelangelo‘s personality


3. In arguing that some of the restored work has already been darkened by
pollution, which of the following assumptions did Scholar A make?
I. Nothing except pollution could have caused the darkening.
II. The darkening indicates that irreversible damage has been done.
III. The atmospheric pollutants are more abundant now than they were
before the restoration.
A. I only
B. I and II
C. II and III
D. I, II and III
E. None of the above