Restoration work can sometimes reveal unsuspected treasures. During the work of safeguarding the Saint-Jean-Blavanant chapel in Plouvien, a village in Finistère, the craftsmen-experts discovered hidden under the lime frescoes probably dating from the 16th century.
The person in charge of this goldsmith’s work, Aude Rebours, told our colleagues from France Télévisions Bretagne of her wonder and her fears at this unexpected discovery: “We are going to do everything to save all of these vestiges. But it will not be easy because everything is not in very good condition and these paintings have been weakened.
Indeed, this unearthing work requires real surgical meticulousness. Scalpel in hand, you have to scrape off the lime that covers the walls with infinite delicacy. This is the only way to preserve the drawings and inscriptions, hidden for many years under this layer. Tristan Mathéo, another member of the restoration team, draws up an initial assessment of these discoveries, and gives dating clues: “On a wall we were able to uncover two characters. It’s worn and incomplete, but their costume evokes the period of the 16th century.
The Sant-Yann association which, in close collaboration with the town hall of Plouvien is directly involved in this formidable restoration work, sees in the discovery of these frescoes a perfect legitimization of their first intuitions. Pierre Jollé, a historic member of Sant-Yan since its creation in 1998, is waiting like Aude Rebours for the end of summer to deliver a precise interpretation of the frescoes and Latin inscriptions.
All that we currently know is that Saint-Jean-Balanant, listed as a historic monument since 1913, is the last vestige of a priory of the Hospitallers of Saint-Jean-de-Jérusalem. The history of this sacred place is also linked to the noble Breton families, Carman, Marc’hec and Penmarch. The frescoes of the chapel of Plouvien could therefore, if they are interpretable, tell us a little more about what happened politically, from the temporal and spiritual points of view, in Brittany between 1500 and 1650…
