Olomouc chemists are examining samples from the repaired St. Moritz Church

Olomouc - Chemists from Palacký University have also joined the extensive renovation of the late Gothic Church of St. Moritz in the center of Olomouc these days. They collected samples from several places on the facade for chemical analysis, which should determine what materials and methods the workers used during the construction of the church. The results of their research should assist restorers in the renovation, which is expected to cost approximately 130 million crowns. The Faculty of Science informs about this on its website. The renovation of the church began at the end of last year and is expected to last until the end of 2021.

In recent days, chemists from the Faculty of Science have collected samples from the window arches and other places on the facade of the monument, where remnants of polychromy were visible. "Additional samples were taken from around the lead inscription on the west side of the church. The purpose is to find out whether there was any colored decoration in these places in the past," said Lukáš Kučera from the Department of Analytical Chemistry.

The samples collected had to be as small as possible so that experts would not damage the monument. "For the basic analysis of stratigraphy, namely embedding the sample in resin and preparing a thin section, I only need a few milligrams. From that, I will take about one-tenth, and detailed analyses will be conducted on that," Kučera added. The result of the chemical analysis, which should be completed during the summer, is expected to provide restorers with information about the material composition, potentially organic substances such as binders that were added to the mortar or pigment layers during the church's construction.

The Olomouc chemists working on the analysis are involved in the Arteca project, which was established last spring. It consists of a thirty-member research team of art historians, chemists, and physicists focused on developing new methods and techniques that could be applied, for example, in the protection and restoration of monuments. The university obtained 60 million crowns in European subsidies for the project.

The renovation of St. Moritz Church, which has been on the list of national cultural monuments since 1995, is the most extensive reconstruction in the last hundred years. "The project includes the construction and restoration of the structures of the entire exterior wall of St. Moritz Church, which are in a critical condition, as well as the construction and restoration of the interior spaces of the southern medieval tower, the insertion of missing floor structures of the tower, and its subsequent public accessibility," said Jiří Gračka, spokesperson for the Olomouc Archdiocese, earlier to ČTK. An important part of the project is also the restoration of the rare Engler organs.