On 28 April 2024, a digital exhibition entitled “The Lost Statues of Bánffy Castle, Bonțida” opened at said castle, created as part of the European SOS Heritage project, with the aim of digitising the surviving pieces of the castle’s Baroque sculpture gallery and presenting them together as a digital collection.

Below you can find the project panel with the ground plan of the building ensemble and the positions of the sculptures, as well as 3D models of the pieces.

Context

Bánffy Castle, Bonțida, once boasted a gallery of Baroque sculptures, unique in Transylvania, created in the mid-18^th century in the time of Count Dénes Bánffy (1723-1780), Master of the Horse to Empress Maria Theresa, and carved by sculptor Johannes Nachtigall (1717-1761). It is likely that during the creation of his sculptures depicting figures from Greco-Roman mythology, the sculptor drew inspiration from contemporary illustrations of the ancient poet Ovid’s Metamorphoses. The gallery of the horseshoe-shaped courtyard, with 37 statues on the interior façade and 3 statues, as well as a host of urns decorated with rococo motifs and human heads on its exterior, was complemented by 3-3 statues above the interior and exterior entrances to the main building, which, to quote József Biró (1907-1945), the first monographer of the castle, „gives the main buildings a princely appearance and softens the warlike impression of the bastions with the secular splendour of the Rococo”.

The events of the Second World War and the subsequent rise of communism sealed the fate of both the castle and the sculpture gallery. The main building, which burnt down in 1944, stood roofless for decades, while the riding school walls, also damaged by fire, collapsed in 1956; its statues being irrevocably lost without a trace. As the state of the nationalised castle kept on deteriorating and its values were threatened by destruction, in 1978 and 1983 most of the still existing statues and urns were transferred to Cluj-Napoca, where they were placed in the National Museum of Transylvanian History (11 statues and 4 urns) and in the courtyard of a building belonging to the Art Museum (now to the Babeș-Bolyai University): 11 statues and 4 urns, and 2 later statues and 1 urn from the castle park. The 5 statues and some fragments that remained on the site, as well as 2 urns that were later recovered, were exhibited by the Transylvania Trust Foundation, which cares for the castle, in the lapidarium that was set up here. The collection was later expanded with 3 statues and 3 urn fragments, thanks to a close collaboration with the National Museum of Transylvanian History. Only one piece of the sculpture gallery still stands in its original place, above the entrance to the stables.

The digital exhibition was created as part of the SOS Heritage project (2022-2024), co-funded by the EU, with the intent of bringing together, albeit virtually, the still existing and accessible sculptures of this Baroque sculpture gallery of outstanding significance. At the beginning of 2024, the Foundation produced photogrammetric images of the statues and urns, which were used to create 3D models that can be viewed, rotated and enlarged on any smartphone. Thus, the digital exhibition will allow visitors to view in ensemble the surviving sculptures of the most important Transylvanian Baroque sculpture gallery.

Watch our “making of” video on this link:

Instructions: the QR codes on the panel correspond to the individual statues or urns, and show their original positions on the ground plan. Scanning the code will display a 3D model of the corresponding statue or urn. The pedestal shows the name of the mythological figure and the current location of the original piece:

FTT lapidarium – the lapidarium of Bánffy Castle, Bonțida

MNIT lapidarium – the Medieval and Early Modern Lapidarium of the National Museum of Transylvanian History, Cluj-Napoca

MNIT storage – the artefacts storage of the National Museum of Transylvanian History, Cluj-Napoca

UBB – Babeș-Bolyai University, Cluj-Napoca

On the model you will see numbers. Tap on them to read interesting facts.

* For Iphone users, click on the icon.

Imprint:

Exhibition concept, texts: Transylvania Trust Foundation, www.transylvaniatrust.ro, www.banffycastle.ro

Photogrammetry, 3D-models: Serestély Szilárd, Lepedus-Sisko Péter

Panel graphics: Könczey Elemér, Idea Plus

We would like to thank the National Museum of Transylvanian History and the Babeș-Bolyai University, Cluj-Napoca, for their cooperation.

The exhibition was created as part of the SOS Heritage project (2022–2024); partners: Mazzini Lab Srl Benefit, Associazione Dimore Storiche Italiane (Italy), Universität für Weiterbildung Krems (Austria), Narodni muzej Kruševac (Serbia); https://www.sos-heritage.eu/.

2024

Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or EACEA. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.