A monumental 17th-century artwork made from painted leather is taking centre stage at Louvre Abu Dhabi following a major conservation project that has transformed one of the museum’s largest and most technically complex recent acquisitions.
The Triumph of David, an 18-metre-long gilded leather decor depicting a royal procession inspired by the biblical story of David and Goliath, has been installed after extensive restoration carried out on-site over the past two years. The work, made up of multiple panels, now anchors a gallery dedicated to the pre-modernist period, reshaping how the space tells stories of artistic exchange across cultures.
For Guilhem Andre, director of scientific, curatorial and collection management at Louvre Abu Dhabi, the unveiling marks the end of a long process involving conservation, research and careful planning.
“It is a great joy to be able to display this large artwork in our gallery. It completely changes this area of the museum,” he said during the installation.
The work entered the museum’s collection in October 2023 after a long journey through European private collections. While its recent history is relatively well documented, its original context remains uncertain. Scientific analysis conducted at the museum dates the work to the mid-17th century and links it stylistically to artists associated with the school of Rembrandt in the Netherlands.
The scene shows a triumphant procession following David’s defeat of Goliath, a popular biblical subject among tapestry designers and gilded leather-makers in early modern Europe. Figures dressed in richly detailed costumes move across an imagined architectural setting that blends Renaissance influences with motifs inspired by the East.
The scale of the work and the richness of its detail is striking. Elaborate costumes, ornate headdresses and gleaming vessels carried by attendants reflect a European fascination with Eastern aesthetics, filtered through imagination rather than direct observation.
“This is how the West reimagined the Eastern world in a way that was, in fact, completely imaginary,” Andre said. “At Louvre Abu Dhabi, we always try to feature encounters between civilisations.”
Beyond its artistic significance, the installation highlights the museum’s growing role in conservation research. The artwork arrived in Abu Dhabi in fragile condition, requiring specialised treatment rarely undertaken on leather works of this scale. Conservators faced the challenge of stabilising a material that is highly sensitive to humidity and temperature, while preserving delicate painted and metallic layers.
Conservator-restorer Celine Bonnot-Diconne, who specialises in leather, first encountered the panels two decades ago while removing them from the walls of Paris’s historic Hotel Lambert. When the panels arrived in Abu Dhabi, they were still covered in protective strips applied during earlier interventions.
“The decor was in pretty bad condition,” she said. “You could not put it on exhibition right away. It had to go through conservation first.”
Leather behaves differently from canvas or wood, reacting quickly to changes in climate. The panels are further complicated by layers of silver leaf coated with yellow varnish to imitate gold, a technique widely used in Europe during the 16th and 17th centuries to create a luxurious effect at a lower cost.
One of the most demanding aspects of the project involved removing hardened glue and canvas added to the back of the panels during the 19th century. The material had become rigid over time and threatened the integrity of the leather underneath. Conservators worked slowly, removing layers centimetre by centimetre to restore flexibility and reveal areas of the composition that had been obscured.
Scientific imaging conducted in Louvre Abu Dhabi’s laboratories also offered new insight into the artwork’s creation, revealing alterations made by the artist during the painting process.
The conservation project also doubled as a training opportunity. Emirati team members worked alongside international specialists, allowing skills and knowledge to be shared as part of the museum’s wider efforts to develop local conservation expertise.
For Bonnot-Diconne, the unveiling carries personal significance. Having followed the artwork’s journey for more than 20 years, she said having it installed in a public gallery feels like a professional milestone.
“When I first saw it, it was part of a private collection and only a few people could see it,” she said. “Now it is in a museum where visitors from everywhere in the world can experience it.”
The installation also reflects the fragmented history of the piece. The panels are displayed in sections rather than a single uninterrupted sequence, suggesting that some parts may have been lost as the work passed through different residences and collections across Europe. Andre said it is possible that additional sections could be identified in the future, though the full story of the artwork’s travels remains incomplete.
Despite unanswered questions, the impact of the piece is immediate. Spanning an entire wall, the composition includes dozens of figures whose gazes are painted using the so-called Mona Lisa Effect.
“I think people will experience a real wow effect,” Bonnot-Diconne said. “Almost all of the figures seem to look at you when you enter.”
At a museum built around the idea of dialogue between cultures, The Triumph of David offers more than an example of 17th-century craftsmanship. Its restoration reveals how artworks continue to evolve through science and conservation, gaining new life and new audiences as they move across places and centuries.
