The researchers unveiled the image that had been painted over 135 years ago.
Researchers from University College London reproduced a "lost" work of art by Vincent Van Gogh using X-rays, artificial intelligence, and 3D printing.
Van Gogh painted over the image of two wrestlers 135 years ago, covering them with flowers. Now, we can see the concealed painting as a part of the "NeoMasters" series of recreations, a project researchers Anthony Bourached and George Cann have been working on since 2019 to bring lost works of art to life. Artist Jesper Eriksson also provided his expertise to make it possible.
The researchers developed a process that uses X-rays to see through layers of paint, AI to extrapolate the artist's style, and 3D printing to fabricate the final piece. The latest project, called "The Two Wrestlers," depicts two shirtless wrestlers grappling in front of an abstract background.
Bourached says that "how much it is like the original painting is impossible to tell at this point because the information doesn't exist. I think it's very convincing—by far the best guess we can get with current technology."
The obscured painting was first discovered in 2012 when art experts at the University of Antwerp investigated whether the work "Still Life with Meadow Flowers and Roses" was an authentic Van Gogh.
The work was authenticated as the wrestlers "displayed brush strokes and pigments that were consistent with Van Gogh, and the subject matter was also a common theme at the Antwerp Art Academy where Van Gogh was studying in 1886."
"This week I painted a large thing with two nude torsos—two wrestlers… and I really like doing that," Van Gogh wrote in a letter to his brother Theo in January of 1886.
Bourached and Cann created a series of algorithms that identified the edges and created an outline of the figures from the X-ray data and then used a neural network to predict the style of colors, details, and brushstrokes of the painting. Finally, the team used a 3D printer to construct the final art piece.
The team also managed to resurrect other images that had been considered lost for many years. In 2021, they recreated a painted-over image of a crouching nude woman beneath the painting "The Blind Man's Meal" by Pablo Picasso.
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