Ermanno Carbonara is an Art Conservator with 30 years of experience who currently works in Italy, throughout North Africa, Central Asia, the Middle East, and in the United States. He holds a master’s degree in Conservation from the renowned School of Mosaics Conservation of Ravenna in agreement with Istituto Superiore per la Conservazione e il Restauro (ISCR) which is recognized by the AIC. He is widely published and has presented his work at a host of international conservation conferences. Some of Ermanno’s work experience in Italy includes the conservation of the Byzantine wall mosaics of the World Heritage Site of Sant’Apollinare Nuovo and Sant’Apollinare in Classe , as well as consulting on the conservation of the mosaics in the Dome of the St. Peter’s Basilica. His work has also included the conservation of important modern mosaics, such as works by Marc Chagall, and has conserved the marble outdoor sculptures at the Este Castle in Ferrara.
Outside of Italy, Ermanno has been a consultant for the last fifteen years for the Getty Conservation Institute (GCI) and its mosaic conservation projects in Tunisia, Morocco, and Lebanon, doing both training of local mosaic conservation technicians and conservation implementation works on-site. In the last years, he has been a conservation consultant for UNESCO on a multi-year conservation program for the Buddhist site of Mes-Aynak in Afghanistan which has involved on-site survey of the cultural artifacts and the development of a GIS database, work at the National Museum of Kabul conserving ancient Buddha sculptures of painted unfired clay and fragments of lime and earth-based painted plasters, and training Afghani archaeologists and conservators from the Ministry of Culture of Afghanistan. Another recent project for UNESCO in Afghanistan is the documentation, condition assessment, conservation planning, and budgeting for the conservation of the surface decoration of the World Heritage site of the Minaret of Jam, working with a team of archaeologists, architects, surveyors, and engineers.
Since moving to Los Angeles in 2017, he has worked on contemporary and historic wall paintings in LA and San Francisco, historic LA architectural finishes, modern sculpture, and a post-flood assessment for the studio of Analia Saban, in addition to continuing his international consulting work for the GCI. Recently, he was the recipient of a Getty Foundation grant to build a conservation lab and conduct training for mosaic conservation technicians in Tunisia, including re-laid mosaics on concrete and reinforced concrete, in partnership with the Institut National du Patrimoine of Tunisia. He is also currently working for LACMA at Watts Towers in Los Angeles.
