National Historical Archive of Italian Restorers – ASRI
The National Historical Archive of Italian Restorers (ASRI), based in Lurano in the Lombardy region, was established to prevent the loss of professional knowledge preserved in the private archives of Italian conservators and restorers. When practitioners retire or pass away, their drawings, reports, photographs and technical notes are often dispersed or lost. In many cases, state or regional archives lack the capacity or mandate to absorb such specialised document collections. ASRI is the only national initiative in Italy dedicated to the history of restoration and ensures that this material is preserved.
The initiative grew from the principle, as defined in the Venice Charter of 1964, that every new conservation intervention should be based on knowledge of previous restorations. ASRI reconstructs the history of earlier interventions on many important works of art and provides a documented record of past treatments that guides future conservation decisions. To date, 33 private archives have been acquired, comprising approximately 1.68 million documents and 550,000 images.
Fundamental core of the project is the free and publicly accessible database RES.I. Now in its third version, it contains around 25,000 detailed records and enables cross-searches in the different archives. The database brings together documentation that would otherwise remain fragmented and makes restoration history accessible for conservation work at regional, national and international levels.
Much of the archives inventory and digitisation is carried out by dedicated volunteers. Public events and professional training activities, including programmes for museum guides on the European history of conservation-restoration and a multimedia museum experience, help to make the archive accessible to the general public.
More than 90 professionals from universities, museums and public institutions have been involved in the project. The organisation received support from the Italian Ministry of Culture, regional funds and private foundations.
The project has also received EU support for its role in developing a European network guided by similar principles. The organisation’s database is prepared for multilingual use, and its code can be reused by other institutions.
The Awards’ Jury drew attention to the fact that “ASRI established, for the first time, a national archive of restorers and created a rare resource that supports future conservation decisions, offering a model that can be followed internationally.”
Contact: Lanfranco Secco Suardo | Associazione Giovanni Secco Suardo | info@associazionegiovanniseccosuardo.it | www.associazionegiovanniseccosuardo.it/en