Madrid, July 25 (EFE)
“I cannot give more specific deadlines but we are talking about a short time. It has been very long, but what we found there was more than we expected. When one, operating on a monument, finds that there are more deficiencies than expected, the obligation is to start again and do things well so that the restoration lasts 50 years and not ten”, he told the press from the El Retiro park.
On the second anniversary of the declaration of the Paseo del Prado and El Retiro as a ‘Landscape of Light’ by Unesco, Rivera visited on Tuesday the restoration works of the monument to Alfonso XII, located on the east side of the El Retiro tobacconist’s in Madrid, where he pointed out that cataloging “makes us more aware of the need to protect what we already have”.
He said it in reference to the monument to Alfonso XII, some work that is part of “preventive protection”, while this enclave “did not have any special problem” beyond some “faults” that have been corrected over the last months.
“We hope more or less that these works will be finished by mid-September. This viewpoint, which began to be built around 1870, is one of the most visited places in El Retiro”, he pointed out about the work, created from the ideas of the architects José Grases and Teodoro de Anasagasti, while the work that culminates the monolith is by Mariano Benlliure.
In this case, the monument was “very affected by the pigeon”, especially in the sculptural groups, which are made of bronze and limestone from Novelda (Alicante), a material that “suffers a lot and deteriorates” both by the pigeon and by adverse weather conditions, explained Blanca Mora, head of restoration services for the Madrid City Council.
For this reason, cleaning work is being carried out and all the structures that make up the work will be treated with the exception of the Mariano Benlliure one, which was treated relatively recently, while anti-bird systems will be established to protect it, he added.