“Si Fanno a Caso”: The Reworking of Renaissance Tin-Glazed Earthenware

Abstract

This conversation between an art historian and a conservator positions ceramics as an art of constantly reworking recipes, of adjusting working methods, of altering surfaces through various deliberate treatments and accidental occurrences. The reworking of ceramics was done on a case-by-case basis, according to Cipriano Piccolpasso’s sixteenth-century notion of “si fanno a caso.” The themes addressed in the discussion will include the retrieval and reworking of recipes, the intentional modifications of the so-called “standards” of production by Renaissance artist-practitioners, the accidental errors that occurred at various stages of the process, the subsequent modifications introduced to deliberately alter specific aspects of the work or to mitigate the damage caused over time or brought about by such disastrous events as the Second World War. The modifications that followed the making of the artworks invite considerations of the restoration and de-restoration of ceramics.