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Conserving Modern Architecture Issue. Spring 2013 (PDF Edition) 29215 GCI_NewsSpr13 R1.indd 1 4/19/13 9:17 AM A Note from the Director For the past few decades, our colleagues who advocated for the preservation of great twentieth-century architecture have been suc- cessful. They have not only saved important buildings—think the De La Warr Pavilion in England or the Century Plaza Hotel in my hometown of Los Angeles—but have also, in the process, raised public consciousness of their significance and helped preserve the ideas of optimism, innovation, and prog- ress that they contain. These colleagues have my admiration and appreciation! Still, despite these successes and a considerable amount of work on issues facing practitioners, done early on by a number of key organizations, the conservation field has lagged behind in the research necessary for the develop- ment of best-practice solutions for the maintenance, repair, and renovation of these structures. Working closely with international partners, our Conserving Modern Architecture Initiative (CMAI) attempts to reinvigorate some of those efforts that began in the 1990s. We seek to bring a strategic focus to these challenges through a program of research, through the development and dissemination of knowledge intended to fill identified gaps in practice, and through training and education efforts. This edition of Conservation Perspectives is a small piece of this effort. The feature article in this edition is authored by Susan Macdonald, who not only is head of GCI Field Projects, but also serves as the project director of the CMAI. In her article she notes the relatively recent emergence of myriad organizations dedicated to saving and conserving modern heritage and delineates the challenges that lie ahead, including achieving widespread recognition and support for the conservation of twentieth-century places, as well as developing a common vision and approach to do so. It is, in fact, the goal of the CMAI to address some of these challenges—and one of the ways in which the CMAI seeks to do this is through model field projects, the first of which is our Eames House Conservation Project. Kyle Normandin, who directs that project for the GCI, describes in an article of his own how the Institute is working with the Charles and Ray Eames Preservation Foundation to assess the current condition of this iconic work of modern residential architecture, and to assist in the development of a long-term conservation management plan for the house, in the process demonstrating how existing conservation methods can be applied to modern cultural heritage sites. Moving from the micro to the macro, Danilo Matoso Macedo and Sylvia Ficher in their article examine some of the preservation issues connected to Brasilia, a city planned and constructed under the principles of modernism; the article explores how today, over a half-century since its inception, Brasilia must grapple with preserving its founding character while accommodating the tremendous growth that has followed its establishment. Growth and change are inevitable, and Charles Birnbaum in his article on modern landscapes argues that preservation is more likely to be successful when the public is engaged and when feasible alternatives to destruction are advanced. And in this newsletter’s spirited dialogue, Catherine Croft, Hubert-Jan Henket, and Johannes Widodo bring differing perspec- tives to questions of temporality and materiality in the quest to preserve the built heritage created in the Modern era. I hope you enjoy this edition of the newsletter and find it valuable. Timothy P. Whalen 29215 GCI_NewsSpr13 R1.indd 2 4/19/13 9:17 AM CONSERVATION PERSPECTIVES Contents 4 FEATURE ARTICLE MODERN MATTERS Breaking the Barriers to Conserving Modern Heritage By Susan Macdonald 10 THE EAMES HOUSE Conserving a California Icon THE GCI NEWSLETTER By Kyle Normandin volume 28 • number 1 • spring 2013 13 BRASILIA Preservation of a Modernist City By Danilo Matoso Macedo and Sylvia Ficher 16 MANAGING CHANGE AND MODERN LANDSCAPES By Charles A. Birnbaum 18 MODERNITY, TEMPORALITY, AND MATERIALITY A Discussion about the Conservation of Modern Architecture 24 KEY RESOURCES A list of key resources related to the conservation of modern architecture 25 GCI NEWS Projects, events, and publications ON THE COVER e National Congress building in Brasilia, designed by Oscar Niemeyer and completed in the 1960s. Photo: Gary Yim. 29215 GCI_NewsSpr13 R1.indd 3 4/19/13 9:17 AM MODERN MATTERS Breaking the Barriers to Conserving Modern Heritage RTICLE A EATURE F he time between a building’s creation and its protection zations dedicated to saving and conserving modern heritage— and conservation has never been as compressed as it is including Docomomo International, the Modern Heritage Com- T for the heritage of the Modern era. Gropius’s Bauhaus mittee of the Association for Preservation Technology (APT), was only forty years old when it was listed in 1964. The city of the ICOMOS International Scientific Committee on Twentieth- Brasilia, designed in 1956, was inscribed on the World Heritage Century Heritage, modern Asian Architecture Network (mAAN), List in 1987. Attempts to inscribe the Sydney Opera House began and various art deco groups—advanced conservation efforts. a mere eleven years after its completion in 1973. Yet despite early The large number of such groups demonstrates an interest in and efforts to protect and conserve the most iconic places of the comfort with identifying the recent past as important and brings Modern era, it was not until the 1990s that the conservation of together sectors of the architectural and conservation commu- modern heritage emerged as a distinct area of practice. That de- nity that had not previously been closely aligned. cade witnessed intense activity by a growing group of practitioners Docomomo, formed in 1988, has been hugely influential, to address conservation of twentieth-century heritage, and by the creating a network of academics and practitioners that catalyzed beginning of the twenty-first century, a number of governmental action within and across more than sixty member countries. and nongovernmental organizations were focused on this work.1 Founded on a different premise from that of other conservation The emergence of local, national, and international organi- groups, Docomomo promotes the continuum of the modernist The Sydney Opera House in Sydney harbor, completed in 1973. The conservation management framework for the structure includes the Utzon Design Principles—authored by the building’s architect, Jørn Utzon, to guide future changes to the building— 4 V. 28 | no. 1 | spring 2013 as well as a conservation management plan. Photo: © Sheridan Burke. 29215 GCI_NewsSpr13 R1.indd 4 4/19/13 9:17 AM philosophy in the practice of contemporary architecture and The limited passage of time in which to assess the Modern simultaneously aims to conserve the legacy of modernism by Movement within the palimpsest of history impacts how con- bringing contemporary architects and critics who are proponents servation is approached and gives rise to the first two challenges. of modernism together with historians and conservationists.2 In the 1990s professional organizations such as APT and government heritage agencies in Europe and North America, Many national and local authorities now include twentieth- including the U.S. National Park Service and English Heritage, century heritage in their listing programs. Nevertheless, in parts organized conferences and workshops and issued publications of the world, there remains nervousness about protecting any- on technical issues; these efforts contributed to international thing but the icons of the Modern era. “There is so much of it,” practice. The ICOMOS International Scientific Committee on “We don’t like it,” and “It’s too hard to deal with” are common Twentieth-Century Heritage began activity in the early 2000s, criticisms. In many areas, twentieth-century structures dominate launching Heritage Alerts, a program advocating for threatened the urban landscape, and for older generations their realization and significant twentieth-century places, and in 2011 adopting is a living, but not necessarily positive, memory. These places are the Madrid Document: Approaches for the Conservation of yet to go through the Darwinian natural selection process, after Twentieth-Century Architectural Heritage.3 Other organizations which the survivors are appreciated as heritage. Thus, questions have also been working in a variety of ways to advance this area are raised about what to protect and how to establish compara- of conservation. tive levels of significance within existing frameworks used in the Considering twenty-five years of practice and all that has heritage identification and assessment process.4 been achieved, it would be easy to surmise that modern heritage Conservation approaches have evolved since the first is well loved, cared for, and conserved. However, many important modern buildings were awarded heritage protection in the late twentieth-century places remain unprotected. There is still little 1970s. Recognition of a broad range of heritage values and types research addressing common technical problems impeding the of heritage places, changes in heritage management, reduced repair of these buildings. With the termination of the Conservation government support, and the importance of public participation of Modern Architecture course—a partnership of various Finnish have all influenced what is protected and how it is conserved. In institutions and
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