'Cartoon' restoration outrages conservationists

The restoration of a statue in northern Spain is making headlines after conservationists denounced it this week for what they said was the transformation of a 500-year-old work of art into a "children's cartoon" effigy. In a post on its website, the Association of Conservators and Restorers of Spain blasted the restoration of the polychrome St. George statue in a church in Estella, in the Navarre region of northern Spain. A staff member in the office of Estella mayor Koldo Leoz told ABC News that the restoration would have been initiated by the parish of St. Michael Church, which would have commissioned a local art school teacher who was happy “to help." The staff member in Leoz's office said that Estella's city council had not been involved in what he described to ABC News as the "grotesque" restoration and said that Leoz was investigating whether or not there is any possibility of removing the restoration without causing any more damage. The mayor was checking with experts about...