The thousands of photos are combined into a digital 3D model using advanced technology. This allows both researchers and visitors to the church to view the sixteenth-century choir vault up close.
“We are working hard in a wobbly container,” says assistant professor of digital art history Sanne Frequin, as she points to her colleague Sjors Nab at a height of thirty meters.
‘Producing a masterpiece on rickety scaffolding’
“This is my first week at work,” jokes Nab. “Working at such a height gives you even more admiration for the painter. I am standing here harnessed in a safe box, but sitting on a wooden, rickety scaffolding and producing such a masterpiece is incredible.”
That masterpiece was created by Jacob Corneliszoon van Oostsanen and is called The Last Judgment. It shows Jesus Christ, who, as a judge, points the living and the dead to heaven or hell on the day of judgment. A firm message to churchgoers to live well. “If it were loose, it would be hanging in a museum.”
The 3D model is a good way to preserve the artwork for the future. After Notre Dame in Paris and the Vondelkerk in Amsterdam went up in flames, recording everything has become extra important. “When things like that happen, it’s important that you have documented what you have. Then a 3D model can help.”
First Naarden, now Alkmaar, later Warmenhuizen?
The first project to create a 3D model from thousands of photos took place almost two years ago in the Grote Kerk in Naarden. Following that research, the Grote Kerk in Alkmaar asked if they wanted to do the same there.
In Naarden it was not yet entirely certain whether it was actually a Van Oostsanen. But in Alkmaar, university lecturer Daantje Meuwissen dares to put her hand into the fire. “There is no signature on it, but after the last restoration and through the research we are doing now, we know for sure.”
After Naarden and Alkmaar, there is another Van Oostsanen on a vault of which the researchers want to make a 3D model: the one in the church of Warmenhuizen. “The more material we have, the better we can compare.”
If Frequin has his way, the researchers will then move on. “I sometimes joke that we are on a crusade. It is a difficult term, but one that describes it,” she says. “We want to digitize all painted vaults in the Netherlands. Precisely because this heritage is so unknown.”
