Indagini diagnostiche della statua lignea della Madonna di Monserrato

The restoration of the wooden statue of Madonna of Montserrat at the Diocesan Museum of Palermo was preceded by a series of chemical-physical and biological investigations which have allowed a better knowledge of the work. In particular the following analyses have been performed on fragment of original material, sampled near the gaps of the wooden statue,: • observations of cross sections to the reflected light Optical Microscope (OM) to identify the stratigraphy and the pictorial materials; • SEM (Scanning Electron Microscopy) observations on cross sections and analysis in microprobe with Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (EDS) for structural and chemical analysis of the single pictorial layers; • X-Rray Diffractometry (XRD) on dust samples to identify the principal mineralogical composition of plasters and pictorial layers; • Fourier Transform - Infrared Spectroscopy (FT-IR) for the characterization of plasters and pictorial layers; • Time of Flight - Secondary Ions Mass Spectometry (ToF-SIMS) for the elementary analysis of the pictorial material; • microscopic (SEM), microbiological (in vitro crops) and molecular (PCR, Polymerase Chain Reaction) investigations for the evaluation of the biological decay. The obtained results have given information both on the executive techniques of the support and the pictorial film and on the conservation state of the work.