A Masterly Hand / Scientia Artis 9

There were also contacts with foreign specialists, such as KimWoods (Open University, UK), who tackled three of the Elsloo sculptures in English collec- tions and more particularly their possible patrons, and Lucretia Kargère (The Metropolitan Museum of Art), who in 2000 had already compared a statue of St Roch in the New York museum with a St Roch attributed to the Master of Elsloo in the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Tours. Furthermore, the kik-irpa was given the opportunity to examine the Elsloo sculptures in the Musée du ­ Louvre (Sophie Guillot de Suduiraut) and the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Lille ( Damien Berné). The researchers were also given access to the sculptures in the Museum Catharijneconvent in Utrecht (Micha Leeflang), in the course of which dendrochronological analyses were carried out. Several colleagues from foreign museums readily agreed to fill in a standard questionnaire compiled by the kik-irpa team about the Elsloo sculptures in their collections, or to ­ provide a report, often accompanied by photographs. We had the willing cooperation of the Skulpturensammlung und Museum für Byzantinische Kunst (Staatliche Museen) in Berlin (Bodo Buczynski, Klaus Leukers), the Loyola University Museum of Art in Chicago (Jonathan Canning), the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Lille (Damien Berné), the Louvre (Sophie Guillot de Suduiraut), the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Tours (Philippe le Leyzour, ­Catherine Pimbert), the Museo Nazionale del Palazzo di Venezia in Rome (Grazia Maria Fachechi, Rossella Vodret) and the Cleveland Museum of Art (Stephen N. Fliegel). This enabled the inclusion of a large number of sculptures in the study. Other researchers who helped in a particular part of the project include Michael Rief (Suermondt-Ludwig-Museum, Aachen) and Ulrike Bergmann ( Fachhochschule Köln, CICS – Cologne Institute for Conservation Sciences). The kik-irpa organized a number of meetings at which the progress of the research was evaluated and important research questions were presented. These were attended by the project staff at the kik-irpa and various already-­ mentioned partners from elsewhere in Belgium and abroad. The successful conference A Masterly Hand. Interdisciplinary Research on the Late-Medieval Sculptor Master of Elsloo in an International Perspective , organized by the kik-irpa on 20-21 October 2011, was the culmination of two years of intense research. Now, two years later, it is followed by the publi- cation of the proceedings in the kik-irpa ’s Scientia Artis series. As the initiating body for the conference and publication the Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage thanks in the first place the Belgian Science Policy for the funding that made the project possible and the Province of Limburg for its interest in the research and for additional financing. We also thank all the partners both inside and outside Belgium for their support and their commit- ment to this project. Without their input we would never have reached this result. We are also extremely grateful to all the owners and collection manag- ers for their unstinted cooperation, trust and warm reception. It is thanks to them that our sometimes days-long activities in situ ran smoothly and cheer- fully. We are particularly indebted to the private owners for giving us access to the Elsloo works in their possession. We are also grateful to Myriam Serck, until May 2011 Director General of the Institute, who supported the project