In 2020, a massive explosion rocked the port of Beirut in Lebanon. It killed more than 200 people and destroyed homes as far as six miles away. It also damaged a historic piece of art: a previously unknown Italian painting of Hercules and Omphale, painted by the female artist Artemisia Gentileschi in the 1600s. The World’s Host Marco Werman talks about what it’s taken to restore the painting with Ulrich Birkmaier, the senior conservator of paintings at The J-Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles, where it’s now finally on display.
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