C O N T E X T 1 4 4 : M A Y 2 0 1 6 47 it as an architectural demonstration of their dynasty’s claim to be the rulers of England,Wales and some of France. For this reason the chapel’s walls are in two parts: the plainer east end and the ante-chapel at the west, ornamented with Tudor imagery. Much happened after Tudor times, including the installation and frequent rebuilding of a great organ, the inauguration in 1918 of the Christmas service of carols and readings, and broadcasts of the service by the BBC from 1928. The chapel’s music with the building’s famous acoustic is now widely celebrated as supported by its older choristers and choir school boys. In 1961 the painting by Peter Paul Rubens of The Adoration of the Magi was donated for eventual installation against the east wall following a re-ordering of this part of the liturgical interior. The altarpiece provides adequate visual focus to culminate a tour of the building’s interior that leaves visitors deeply moved. The Saltmarsh volume ends with the building’s stonework complete early in the reign of Henry VIII. Readers will not be able to make use of it for the remainder of the story to date, or for an account of the stained glass and the elaborate wooden furnishings. Instead this book takes its place beside The History of the King’sWorks (1963-82) as a fully documented history of the construction of a great royal building, including the cost, sources of materials and organisation of the vast workforce required. King’s chapel is contemporary with the Vatican’s Sistine Chapel as architecturally restored in 1477 and finished with its famous ceiling in 1512. The two buildings occupy a mid-point between the medieval and modern worlds. Thus we know about the masons who created King’s, including the designer and constructor of the celebrated fan vault, John Wastell (1460-1515), and we can begin to see the emergence of architects as ‘individuals’ in the modern sense. The perpendicular style of the chapel would turn out to be the English nation’s most original contribution to European architecture. Often imitated, especially for the construction of schools and other seats of learning, the style received its definitive architectural form and best ornamental flourishes here at Cambridge. The book will find its way into scholarly libraries and on to the shelves of collectors. Eventually copies will reappear on the second-hand market, and the price will escalate unless a second edition replaces the 500 copies of the book’s current print run. In the meanwhile, it is available from the college at shop.kings.cam.ac.uk at a weight in excess of three pounds that breaks my kitchen scales due to the luxury-grade paper on which it is printed. As the result of so much work by its original author, the editors, Peter Monteith and Bert Vaux, and three other contributors from King’s College, the volume pushes the study of the creation of a single building to the limits. It brings together, once and for all, the material evidence of a great structure with all the written records of its construction. Graham Tite, conservation officer, BEAMS, Hertford Global perspectives A Companion to Heritage Studies William Logan, Máiréad Nic Craith and Ullrich Kockel (editors),WileyBlackwell, 2016, 618 pages, 37 black and white illustrations, six tables, ISBN 978 1 118486 66 5, hardback, £96 Edited by three academic specialists in heritage studies and comprising contributions from equivalent interdisciplinary experts across the globe, this is an enjoyable read. The underlying question posed is on the direction of heritage appreciation and its management. Thirty-seven papers address this in a revealing exploration of the significant and diverse issues which demand attention as our understanding of the value and returns of heritage evolves, from the League of Nations, through the heritage boom of the 1990s to today. Francesco Bandarin rightly notes that many of these challenges are uncomfortable. As a taster, the issues addressed, with helpful analysis in each case, include intellectual property, the impact of the digital age, indigenous rights and the global implications of the World Heritage Convention, politics and destruction, heritage in war zones and meeting natural disaster. The use of heritage (especially the less costly intangible heritage) as a nationalist card, now and historically, is set out. From transnational challenges such as protecting the silk roads from China to the west, to the benefits and abuse of world heritage inscription in an African context, or the Asian emphasis on the intangible, the compendium provides rich testament to the import and value of the historic environment in all its forms. As practitioners in the field, it is inevitable that some of the findings collated will provoke healthy debate. Heritage dividend or deficit, for example, or the equations used in the financial calculus for protecting the heritage. The overall aim of heritage conservation, stated in the World Heritage Convention, we are told is ‘to give the cultural and natural heritage a function in the life of the community’. Surely it has that function and the aim is rather to secure, interpret and translate what it already so incalculably provides? The most immediately relevant articles for conservation professionals in the UK are those of Ron van Oers and by Keir Reeves and Gertjan Plets. The general decline in resources in western Europe, van Oers explains, has met with too narrow an understanding of conservation’s return among the educated elite and an over-dependency on government funding, to the detriment of the heritage. Reeves and Plets offer an invaluable way of understanding the relevance of heritage to social needs and especially to social cohesion. Demonstrating the holistic and embedded benefits of the historic environment to wider stakeholders remains a seemingly under-pursued and as yet ineffective charge.While, gladly, recognition across the disciplines of the role of heritage in providing for and supporting our well-being is emerging, the consequential actions and investments to utilise this understanding are not yet following through.
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MjgyMjA=