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Acknowledgements
Many thanks go to Jennifer Dinsmore and Alison Richmond for their support, information, suggestions and wise words.
Notes
1 Jonathan Ashley-Smith, ‘Losing the Edge: The Risk of a Decline in Practical Conservation Skills’, Journal of Institute of Conservation 39, no. 2 (2016): 119–32, http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/19455224.2016.1210015 (accessed 27 November 2017).
2 Jonathan Ashley-Smith, ‘What's So Ethical about Doing Nothing’ (presentation at the 45th Annual Conference of the American Institute for Conservation (AIC), Chicago, May 2017), https://aics45thannualmeeting2017.sched.com/event/8xAH/beyond-treatment-whats-so-ethical-about-doing-nothing (accessed 26 November 2017).
3 In the UK in the 1970s they were mostly men.
4 Similar advances were being made in other specialist disciplines including textiles, paintings and paper conservation.
5 See M. Kirby Talley, ‘The Delta Plan: A Nationwide Rescue Operation’, Museum International UNESCO: Preventive Conservation 51, no. 1 (1999): 11–5, http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0011/001149/114933e.pdf (accessed 26 November 2017).
6 The MGC later merged with the Libraries and Information Commission to become briefly ‘Re:source’ and then the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council (MLA), which was disbanded in 2010 and all functions transferred to the Arts Council England and the National Archives in 2011.
7 In 1988 the UK’s Museum Registration Scheme was first established and in 2004 became the Accreditation Scheme with standards set out for museums to ‘assess their current performance, as well as supporting them to plan and develop their services’; see http://www.artscouncil.org.uk/supporting-museums/accreditation-scheme-0 (accessed 26 November 2017).
8 Now run by Arts Council England, GIS provides cost free indemnity, as an alternative to commercial insurance, for institutions borrowing art or cultural items for display or study.
9 Jonathan Ashley-Smith, Nick Umney and David Ford, ‘Let’s Be Honest—Realistic Environmental Parameters for Loaned Objects’, Studies in Conservation 39 (1994), Issue sup2: ‘Preprints of the Contributions to the Ottawa Congress, 12–16 September 1994. Preventive Conservation: Practice, Theory and Research’: 28–31, http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1179/sic.1994.39.Supplement-2.28?journalCode=ysic20 (accessed 26 November 2017).
10 The HLF website states: ‘£7.7 billion has been awarded to over 42,000 projects since 1994’; https://www.hlf.org.uk/about-us (accessed 26 November 2017).
11 This was a postgraduate programme jointly run by the Royal College of Art (RCA) and the Victoria and Albert Museum, in association with the Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine, and later in conjunction with other museums and institutions. The course closed in 2009–10.
12 The City and Guilds of London Art School offers a BA (Hons) Conservation Studies Course and an MA Conservation Course validated by Birmingham City University. It still retains its connection with craft skills and hands-on conservation; see http://www.cityandguildsartschool.ac.uk/postgraduate-conservation/ (accessed 27 November 2017).
13 ‘What’s So Ethical about Doing Nothing’.
14 In 1989 UK student grants were frozen and student loans introduced. By 1997 part of the tuition fees were to be paid by every student each year and grants were abolished.
15 This has not been the case in all of Europe, where, in some countries, craft and trade skills are still taught to traditional standards and practitioners are viewed with the same respect as other professions.
16 Whilst contributing to many publications and discussions on risk he also wrote essential Risk Assessment for Object Conservation (Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann, 1999).
17 Personal communication with Jennifer Dinsmore, stone conservation module leader, City and Guilds of London Art School, November 2017.
18 The British Standard Institute's BS 5454 is a British Standard for the construction of repositories for archive collections including environmental parameters. It was replaced in 2012 by BSI PD 5454:2012 ‘Guide for the storage and exhibition of archival materials’ and is now superseded by 2017's BS4971:2017 ‘Conservation and care of archive and library collections’. See, https://www.bsigroup.com/en-GB/about-bsi/media-centre/press-releases/2017/october/British-Standard-for-conservation-and-care-of-library-collections-revised-/ (accessed 26 November 2017).
19 Ashley-Smith, ‘What's So Ethical about Doing Nothing’.
20 The Institute of Conservation's (Icon) Internship Programme (IIP) includes monies for bursary support for interns, supervision by accredited conservators and monitoring by Icon's intern advisers. Icon is also working to develop conservation apprenticeships across England; see https://icon.org.uk/what-is-conservation/internships and https://icon.org.uk/conservation/careers-training/trailblazer-apprenticeships (both accessed 26 November 2017).
21 Such a system has economic implications, but does give applicants the chance to gain experience working with conservators and restorers before beginning their studies.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Frances Halahan
Frances Halahan ACR is an accredited conservator currently working with Jennifer Dinsmore ACR as a conservation and collection consultant to institutions and private collectors in the UK and abroad. She began her career in the Research Department of the British Museum and then went on to work in the UK and abroad as an objects conservator. She was head of the ceramics conservation course at West Dean College and then of the conservation and restoration studies course at the City and Guilds of London Art School. In 2003 she co-authored Looking After Antiques updating the 1987 edition published by the National Trust.