The New Carlsberg Foundation’s 75th birthday present to H. M. Queen Margrethe II is a thorough restoration of the large painting A Banquet at the Court of the German Emperor Charles VI. Since 1872, the painting has hung at Fredensborg Palace.
From 29 October, for a period of four months, visitors to the National Gallery of Denmark, SMK, will be able to observe the museum’s conservators at work, as they restore the painting, wielding scalpels and applying pigments.
The painting, which was created by Johann Salomon Wahl circa 1741, was acquired for The Royal Danish Kunstkammer that same year and has been included in the royal collections ever since.
Painstaking process
The painting is in bad shape, and for a number of years it has been too delicate to be put on display. Poor adhesion between the paint layer and the canvas has caused paint to peel off in many places. Therefore, the painting is in need of thorough conservation and restoration, which has now been made possible with the donation from the New Carlsberg Foundation.
In a painstaking process requiring more than 2,200 work hours, the conservators will reattach unstable paint, laminate the old canvas onto a new one and carry out extensive retouching.
When the conservation process is completed, the painting will be returned to Fredensborg Palace.
Historic union
A Banquet at the Court of the German Emperor Charles VI commemorates the marriage of the emperor’s eldest daughter, Maria Theresa, to Francis Stefan of Lorraine. Their union was an important event in European history: Upon her father’s death a few years later, Maria Theresa became the sovereign of the Austrian and Hungarian lands as the Habsburg family’s first female successor to the throne. When Francis Stefan was subsequently elected Holy Roman Emperor, their marriage expanded and reaffirmed the Habsburg family’s power in Europe.