The research is being carried out by Kadriorg Art Museum and the Estonian Academy of Arts (EKA) and started on Tuesday (March 26). It aims to map the condition and damage of the palace's murals.

In the main hall, there is one big painting with four smaller ones around its edges. This is Estonia's most important mural on plaster from the first half of the 18th century. Indirect evidence suggests it was created by Johann Friedrich Londicer in 1746.

"One part of the current research is to clarify or find confirmations or references to the exact date of completion of the palace, as it was built during the Great Northern War and we have almost no surviving documentation. We do not know whether it was completed in the 1720s or 1740s," Murre explained.

Murre told "Terevision" a payment slip had been found in the archives in Moscow to Londicer that shows work was carried out at Kadriorg Place in 1746. However, it is not known if this was to repair damage due to a fire or for the start of work on the mural.

She said the team is currently investigating whether more than one artist contributed to the work.

The focus of the main image is the story of Diana and Actaeon from Ovid's "Metamorphoses". The painting is based on an engraving from a French edition of his poems made by the Flemish artist Magadalena van de Passe.

"The painting shows the story of Diana and Actaeon, a prince [and] hunter who happened to see the goddess of hunting bathing with nymphs. The goddess punished him for this and turned him into a deer, and his own hunting dogs mauled him to death," Murre explained.

"In the context of early 18th-century court art, it referred to military campaigns. Russia won a victory over King Charles XII of Sweden, and these hunting dogs refer to the former allies who exchanged sides," she added.

The four smaller ceiling paintings depict a bunch of fruit symbolizing the country's prosperity and harmony, a swallow bringing the good news of spring's arrival, a lily suggesting purity, and roses signifying beauty and suffering.

Murre said researchers are most interested in the history of the murals' restoration.

"We are investigating how the profession changed from a restorer to a conservator. More extensive work on this ceiling painting was undertaken in the 1930s, when the entire ceiling structure was replaced, the painted layer was fixed with plaster and the ceiling was removed from the painting. The beams were sawed off and the painting fixed to the new ceiling.," she explained.

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