Paintings by Alessio Erardi, Stefano's son, dating back to about 1716, on the vaulted ceiling of the church of Our Lady of Victory in Valletta, are being given a new lease of life through an ongoing restoration project being undertaken by lecturers and students from the Courtauld Institute of Art at the University of London.

The restoration works are being carried out in conjunction with the Ministry for Resources and Infrastructure and are being coordinated by the Valletta Rehabilitation Project.

Steve and Lisa Shekede, who are leading the project, first came to Malta to work on paintings at the Grandmasters' chapel in the Palace in 1997.

"That was the first project in which we were involved through the Valletta Rehabilitation Project. And never looked back since. On some projects we involved final year students and in others we had other professionals," Ms Shekede said.

The initial contact was made by Ray Bondin, who then headed the Valletta Rehabilitation Project, and work on other projects, including the vaults of Our Lady of Victory, started.

"We usually come and work for about two months at a stretch. We are about half way into the paintings by Erardi. It's hard to say how long the rest will take because you never know what you will find," Ms Shekede said.

The restorers stabilise the paint surface, embark on a programme to remove salts that come out of the stone and finally use a solvent to remove the varnish.

"Sometimes there is a lot of mending to do because of flaking stonework. When paint has flaked, we patch it up but do not carry out any reconstruction. We simply fill in these areas with earth colours without trying to recreate anything. The human eye will bring everything together," Ms Shekede said.