Who’s responsible for this?
Extracts from a keynote address to the CSAAR Conference Responsibilities and Opportunities in Architectural Conservation: Theory, Education, and Practice, November 2008
Peter Phillips BArch MBdgSc FRAIA RIBA AIAMA MICOMOS
President, Australia ICOMOS
Responsible is a word with two slightly different meanings: one referring to the past (whom can we blame?) and one that refers to the future (what is our duty? – and to whom or what?). This talk describes a few of the things for which the author has been responsible (in both senses of the word) during his 25 years as a conservation architect, including some of the opportunities that have arisen (both those taken and those missed), and some tips for conservation practice.
Being a conservation architect in Australia means dealing with buildings that are at most a little over 200 years old. The Aboriginal people, who were there for 50,000 years or so before European settlement, saw no need to construct monuments because nature had already done so for them, although they certainly decorated their surroundings.
The first substantial structure in Australia, therefore, was Government House at Sydney Cove, the foundation stone of which was laid by the first Governor, Arthur Phillip, in May 1788. The building was altered and enlarged a number of times and eventually demolished in 1845, and it is now only an archaeological site marked by some paving …
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