Hidden 13th century. The frescoes of Angers Cathedral record

A series of 13th-century frescoes covering the seven bays of the apse of Angers Cathedral, which have been hidden behind the Baroque wooden choir seats since the 18th century, have been documented and photographed for the first time. A team of researchers and conservators at the University of Cambridge’s Hamilton Kerr Institute spent several years taking more than 8,000 photos of the murals, and then spent years painstakingly stitching them together digitally to create the first complete Full color image of gothic masterpiece.

The frescoes were rediscovered in 1980 by conservators during work on the bay of the cathedral’s apse. The frescoes were whitewashed after a fire in 1451, which ironically saved them from the destruction of the Huguenot Iconocrat movement, which destroyed much of the rest of French Gothic Painting series. 1562. Additional layers of stucco and new high choir seats were added in the 18th century, known as the addition of dark woodwork, which extends to the walls ten feet high.

In 1984, restorers began removing the stucco, a challenging process that took a decade to complete because of the limited space in which they were working—a gap several feet wide between the back of the wood paneling and the 13th-century wall . The restoration uncovered Gothic oil paintings rich in vermilion, verdigris, azure and lead white. The vivid colors and exceptional design quality place them among the best, if not the best, of their kind in France from the second half of the 13th century.

These frescoes depict scenes from the life of St. Maurille, the 5th-century bishop of Angers, whose relics are preserved in his shrine on the high altar of Angers Cathedral. According to a ninth-century hagiography, Morilla was so ashamed after his failed attempt to resurrect a boy that he fled to England and threw the keys to the cathedral into the sea. There he sought salvation by performing penance as the king’s humble gardener. He worked as a manual laborer for seven years while the Angevin family sought him out to take him home. They eventually found him and he returned to France. During the voyage, a fish was caught that easily swallowed the key, so Morrill also retrieved the key to the cathedral.

He then tried again to bring the boy back to life, and succeeded the second time. The boy came to life again and grew up to become Saint Rene. Rene’s shrine is located under the apse of the cathedral and is painted with frescoes. The frescoes in bays 3-7 are all scenes from this story. Compartments 1 and 2 focus on his early life, first with Moriler’s ordination by Saint Martin of Tours in Compartment 1, and then with his first miracle, the sending down of fire from heaven to destroy Compartment 2 a pagan temple.

None of this has been visible to the public since the 15th century, and due to its extremely awkward location, the entire scene is not visible to the naked eye. Photography is even more complex than visual inspection as it requires lights, lenses and angles to capture.

The location of the painting made most ideal conditions impossible. As mentioned earlier, the paintings are accessed through a narrow passage with an irregular floor. Due to their size, it was impossible to have adequate access to all areas of all paintings, so keeping the camera level and at right angles to the surface was difficult. The regular and uniform snapping pattern is also a problem when changing positions, as is always maintaining a constant working distance. This results in a different magnification between the two shots. Taking a photo that covers all areas means having to tilt the camera to include certain areas, creating a degree of parallax within some of the images to be stitched. This also means that the distance from the surface and the magnification of the image will change.

Restricted access also affected lens selection. While a telephoto lens is ideal, there isn’t enough room to go back far enough to use a telephoto lens. Therefore, it is necessary to take a lot of smaller images while trying to keep the magnification consistent. The painted walls are curved and have narrow aisles, so it is important to keep the lights reasonably close to the shooting area. Moving the light too far away can create a “slanted light” effect that hinders the stitching. We intentionally use battery powered lighting to eliminate the risk of trailing cables in potentially hazardous situations.

The stitching of the images cannot be automated because in some areas the distortion caused by the difficulty of shooting is too great for the software (Adobe Photoshop) to cope with. Instead, the images were stitched together by hand, which means they should be viewed as photographic reconstructions rather than accurate, measured photographic records of the paintings. Nonetheless, they allow the style, technique and imagery of the original to be studied in an unprecedented way.

Read the Hamilton Kerr Institute Bulletin Issue 10 to learn all about these extraordinary paintings and the extraordinary research that brought them to the world.