Restorer / conservator
Charles Balliard
fl. 1870–1909
Restorer at the Metropolitan Museum who worked on Cesnola's sculptures and the Athienou sarcophagus and was described in the 1883-84 Feuardent libel trial.
Biography
The Athienou sarcophagus at the Metropolitan Museum of Art carried the restorer's name in the title of an 1881 article. Charles Balliard worked on Cesnola's sculptures there, and in May 1881 Gaston Feuardent titled that article "The Cesnola-Baillard Sarcophagus" and quoted the sworn statement of George C. Cox that Baillard had done part of the engraving on the hunting side and was proud of it3.
At the libel trial of 1883-84 Feuardent's witnesses described his work at the Central Park building. Charles Henkel testified that Balliard and Vallosio, described as Cesnola's newly employed restorers, stripped earlier plaster from statues and re-restored them; that Balliard made a new leg for the Hercules, replacing one by Theodore Gehlen; and that after the controversy began he broke plaster noses and ears from statues on a Sunday1. Dickson B. Alley said he saw Balliard several months at work, preparing the baths for the bronzes and sawing legs and bases, and that Balliard knocked the nose off the "Egyptian warrior" after the controversy started1. These are the accounts of witnesses for Feuardent. Balliard was not a party to the case.
Hermary and Mertens write that he left notes in 1907 from which a report in the Museum's Archives was written, and that he was still employed in 19097. Before the cleaning of 1909 the Museum obtained from him a statement of the state of the sculptures when he first took them in hand, and John Linton Myres wrote that the removal of the stone-wash confirmed its accuracy4. His dates of birth and death are not known.
Life and work
- c. 1880Alley's testimony (p. 24): he did not see Gehlen but saw Balliard, 'several months at work' at the Park museum, taking statues apart and restoring them with Cesnola directing; Balliard prepared the bath that brightened the bronzes to new-bronze colour, put them in a kettle that made them look old again, sawed legs off statues and bases off objects, removed stone legs for plaster on sphinx no. 35, knocked off the plaster nose of the 'Egyptian warrior' after the Art Amateur controversy began, and used tobacco juice to hide a fresh scratch. On the Sunday after the Art Amateur's article he took the statuette of Venus away and returned it on the Monday with the mirror changed; Alley told him jokingly that carving it was the way out of the scrape.
- 1880–1881Cox (Jan. 1884 report, p. 55) said the repair-room was kept locked; when Balliard was down-town Prime brought friends in, and Balliard, offended, had a new lock fitted: he had no objection to Prime, who often came with Cesnola, seeing the work, but did object to his friends. Cox saw a new stone leg made for Hercules, a new base for the bearded Venus (one finger too many removed after Earl Shinn noticed it), a red ribbon painted on the sphinx's neck and blue points on the sarcophagus; figures were cut with a graver by Balliard 'at his suggestion' (the pronoun is ambiguous: Cox's or Balliard's) to bring out the lines for photography.
- 1880Savage's testimony (Jan. 1884 report, pp. 55-56): while preparing a catalogue he noticed that a finger of the bearded Venus was plaster; he told Cesnola and 'by his orders Balliard removed it'. Savage also said Cesnola told him that the first he knew of any restoration was on returning from his 1880 vacation at Richfield Springs, when Balliard informed him restorations had been discovered; that he had ordered Balliard to change all so-restored figures back to their original condition, and that the collection was then entirely free from restorations. Savage built his Evening Post interview denying Feuardent's charges on that assurance.
- May 1881Feuardent's article 'The Cesnola-Baillard Sarcophagus' quotes Cox's sworn statement that the hunting-scene side of the Athienou (Golgoi) sarcophagus, broken in pieces, was repaired and the engraving on added parts made 'by Mr. Baillard', who was 'very proud' of the work and asked for a photograph of it; Cox saw him do part of the engraving. The title attaches Balliard's name to the sarcophagus.
New YorkFeuardent 1881, pp. 113-114
- 1880sPer Charles Henkel's testimony as reported in The Art Amateur (plaintiff-sympathetic), Cesnola instructed his 'newly employed restorers, Messrs. Balliard and Vallosio' at the Central Park museum to remove the dirt and plaster of earlier restorations from statues that had broken in transit; afterwards the pieces were 'turned over' to them for the treatment 'to re-convert them into first-class antiquities': hammer, chisel, wire brush and a coloured wash. Henkel said Balliard made a new leg for the Herakles from Golgoi stone, replacing the one Gehlen had made. A photograph showing Henkel, Balliard and Vallosio in the repairing-room was shown in court.
- 1880sHenkel (p. 24) also said Balliard cut off the sandals Gehlen had put on a priest statue and replaced them, worked on the bearded Venus, priests nos. 21-22 and two double sphinxes (one given a new head), the little Hercules (stone leg for Gehlen's wooden one), bathed bronzes in acid, and, one Sunday after the controversy began, broke plaster noses and ears off statues on exhibition with Henkel's help. Cesnola's order to 'his newly employed restorers' included the stripping of earlier restorations from statues soaked in the tank.
- 1907Hermary and Mertens (2014) say Balliard 'left notes' in 1907 from which a report was written, now in the Metropolitan Museum's Archives; they quote it in catalogue entries (stele with sphinxes: 'repairs and restorations by Balliard'; a sarcophagus: 'Nothing has been done to the sarcophagus at the Museum, but repairs were made in Cyprus by General Cesnola. The plaster restoration of the lid was made by Cicogna about five years ago'; another piece: Gehlen put it together about two years before Balliard's repairs, and pieces joined by Gehlen were not in their proper places). They add that Balliard 'had left the association of a head with a body to Cesnola' and was still employed in 1909 when Myres began his study.
New YorkHermary & Mertens 2014
- 1909Before the 1909 cleaning of the Cesnola sculptures, the Museum obtained from Balliard 'a full statement of his recollection of the state in which the sculptures were when he first took them in hand, and of what he did to them'. Myres (Handbook, p. xxii) says the later removal of the stone-wash confirmed the accuracy of his memory; he was 'actively concerned in the original installation'. Marangou lists Balliard's 'Report to the Metropolitan Museum of Art', MMA Bulletin June 1907 (sic) as a source.
- 1909Hermary notes that Myres stressed the cleaning of the objects carried out in 1909 'par Charles Balliard' was necessary; in the next sentence he says Myres admitted 'a few mistakes' in the collection.
New YorkHermary 2001, p. 153
Connections
11 peopleFieldwork & employment
- Employed by Luigi Palma di Cesnola1879–1881
Disputes & the law
- Subject of testimony by Dickson B. Alley1883–1884
Colleagues & contacts
- Connected with Alexander D. Savage1880–1881
- Worked with Charles Henkel1880
- Worked with Dickson B. Alley1880
- Worked with George C. Cox1880
- Connected with Theodore Gehlenprobably1880
- Worked with Vallosio1880
- Connected with Cicogna1907
- Connected with John Linton Myres1909
- Connected with Bryantpossibly
- Connected with Dodgepossibly
- Succeeded Theodore Gehlen
Sources
- 1. (1883). “The Feuardent-Cesnola Trial”. The Art Amateur 10, 23-24. Online
- 2. (1884). “The Feuardent-Cesnola Trial”. The Art Amateur 10, 55-56. Online
- 3.G. L. Feuardent (1881). “The Cesnola-Baillard Sarcophagus”. The Art Amateur 4, 113-114.
- 4.J. L. Myres (1914). Handbook of the Cesnola Collection of Antiquities from Cyprus. New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art.
- 5.A. G. Marangou (ed.) (2000). The Consul Luigi Palma di Cesnola 1832-1904: Life and Deeds.
- 6.A. Hermary (2001). “Sculptures de la collection Cesnola: le prêtre à la tête de taureau”. Cyprus in the 19th Century AD: Fact, Fancy and Fiction, 153-155.
- 7.A. Hermary, J. R. Mertens (2014). The Cesnola Collection of Cypriot Art: Stone Sculpture. New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art.
- 8. (1884). “The Feuardent-Cesnola Trial”. The Art Amateur 10, 55-56. Online
- 9. (1883). “The Feuardent-Cesnola Trial”. The Art Amateur 10, 23-24. Online