With the horrible version of the statues?

They just look ... bad.

While photography destroyed academic art almost to extinction, thank heavens it's still trained and you can find practicing artists. Finding good ones might be a bit hard though.

So you could find a _bad_ artist to help you in your reconstruction project.

But finding an incompetent accomplice probably is not in anyones best interest.

So while hiring _anyone who claims to be an artist_ might be procedurally and managerially an approved method, it really is not the outcome anyone actually woudl want to have. So whatever happened here ... it does not count as professional reconstruction.

You don't need to be an art historian or an artist to recognize this.

You just need to compare them to other art from the period and the frescoes, and consider which one you find more appealing. And once you do this, there is a fair chance you will recognize the "good" art feels like an order of magnitude more appealing to you, even if you don't have the training to recognize the exact features that cause this appeal.

Perhaps... it's just that they collaborated with experts on publishing coloring books for five year olds due to some reason.

The article makes very explicit proofs, in showing paintings of painted sculptures, where the sculptures are painted with very appealing, naturalistic hues.