C O N T E X T 1 4 1 : S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 5 11 Cultural connections: conserving the diversity of place IHBC Annual School 2015 Images of ISIS deliberately destroying Syrian antiquities are shocking: the more so because they are an extreme version of what many IHBC members deal with every day. When in the UK we argue about the degree and type of value that a historic building might have, the discussion is mediated through policies, statutes, standards and professions. We understand the perspectives of the people we deal with. We appreciate, more or less, their motivations, their aesthetic preferences and their attitudes to history. We can imagine ourselves in their shoes. Most of us find it almost impossible to understand the minds of the young men we see assaulting ancient buildings in Syria with sledgehammers and explosives. For them the existence of something erected to the glory of the wrong god is a crime, and the brutal murder of anyone who seeks to protect such structures and artefacts is justified. So it is useful to be reminded that our own culture once held equally extreme attitudes. Jonathan Foyle, former chief executive at the World Monuments Fund Britain, told the Annual School (page 22) that Lincoln Cathedral, whose ‘biography’ he has recently written, ‘can be read on one level as a representation of cultural hatred and persecution’ against Jews. Yet, paradoxically, he said, ‘beautiful materials, crafts and design can render such unethical ideas into exquisite architecture that we all value for itself’. Interpreting and appreciating such a building, and helping others do so, can be harder than it might first appear. So it was good to hear Sharman Kadish, director of Jewish Heritage UK, introducing what she said was Britain’s first nonChristian, religious historic building preservation organisation (page 25), and Shahed Saleem outlining the British landscape of mosques (page 27). Many synagogues have become redundant, leading to closure, abandonment and demolition, Kadish said. Saleem spoke of the history of the mosque in Britain being uncharted, unrecorded and in danger of being lost completely. Some of Britain’s heritage is easy to appreciate and explain. Other examples, particularly those that relate to ways in which people, now and in the past, have been different to one another, are not. Facing up to diversity is the first step in tackling that conundrum. Thanks go to the organising committee: front (l-r)– Kate Knights, Heather Jermy, Amanda Rix; back – Paul Rhymes, Chris Bennett, David Edleston, Prue Smith, Fiona Newton (All annual school photos are by Jonathan Taylor, Cathedral Communications, unless otherwise credited.)
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