C O N T E X T 1 1 5 : J U LY 2 0 1 0 3 branch territory. It is an area stretching from the Scottish Borders down to Yorkshire and Lancashire, including two national parks and some of the most diverse and stunning natural and man-made heritage in the UK. As part of the IHBC’s annual council meetings taking place outside London, the North branch will host a seminar in Newcastle on Friday 24 September. It will look at issues of resourcing heritage management in the context of anticipated public sector cut-backs. The event will be linked to a reception the preceding evening which will provide an opportunity for members and colleagues to meet, network and learn about the IHBC’s national and regional operations. The keynote speaker at the Friday seminar will be north of England architectural historian, broadcaster and author John Grundy. Other speakers include Carol Pyrah, north east regional director of English Heritage; Philip Grover of Grover Lewis Associates; Helen Brownlie of Allerdale Borough Council; Graham Bell of North of England Civic Trust; Ian Ayris of Newcastle City Council; and IHBC projects officer Fiona Newton and president Eddie Booth. For details see the IHBC’s website and newsblogs. Penicuik House Project Penicuik House, south of Edinburgh, has stood as a ruin ever since it was completely gutted by fire in 1899. It remains the focus of the important designed landscape of the Penicuik Estate. Now entering its third year, the Penicuik House Project aims to consolidate and preserve this important historical structure, and improve surrounding areas and landscape features. A major aspect of the project is the range of training opportunities in traditional skills that is available. These include training for building professionals, contractors and homeowners. The project also offers opportunities for students, young people and interested groups to visit the site and gain an understanding of building conservation and traditional construction techniques. This year’s work will focus on two of the most important rooms of the house; the former entrance hall and the former Ossian Saloon. The Ossian Saloon would have been the main reception room of the house. It was lavishly decorated in an Ossianic theme by Alexander Runciman in 1773. It had always been hoped that some of the decorative plasterwork from the ceiling of the Ossian Saloon may have survived the fire and be buried under the debris which has built up on the floor of the ruin. Initial investigations have proved promising. Finds include a decorative dado tile and pieces of plasterwork scroll. A new training centre built within the ruin of Penicuik House is in use. See www.penicuikhouse.co.uk for details of events, courses and seminars, and contact [email protected] about group visits or for information. Mortar expertise The Scottish Lime Centre Trust’s consulting arm, Charlestown Consultants, has gained a reputation for expertise in the analysis of traditional mortars, and the specification of mortars for repair and restoration of historic buildings. The trust has an in-house lab facility, and holds a comprehensive database of commercially available sands and aggregates for matching new mortars to old. Analysis of historic mortars provides essential information to assist in the specification of compatible materials for conservation and repair work. This is particularly relevant where patching and consolidation of historic mortars, midday, this small square fills up with shoppers arriving from the hinterland of the Castello quarter of Venice to make their way across a single bridge. This bridge, seen on the left of the drawing, provides the best direct access to the markets of Rialto. Consequently it is a great place to enjoy urban bustle and to down in a nearby bar a glass or two of chilled white wine (the ombra or shade that traditionally precedes lunch). This remarkable drawing records the nearly unchanged campo in superb detail. It is not ‘ideal’ architecture, but a truthful record of a familiar scene. It sets out in perspective the carefully observed realities of floor slabs, walls, windows, chimneys and roofs. A powerful sense of place is conveyed in visual art. It marks the beginning of a Venetian tradition that culminated 200 years later in the art of Canaletto. Lippi’s Triumph of St Thomas Aquinas (BM) demonstrates the role that drawing assumed in the preparation of paintings. This is an elaborate piece of architectural perspective, with the saint enthroned amid monumental structures in the style of Roman palaces. It shows that drawing became an indispensable art. Lippi’s drawing is evidence of a preliminary stage in the preparations to fresco the Carafa Chapel in the Roman church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva. Such large projects required advance planning in order to transfer an agreed scheme from a sheet of paper to the vast walls of churches or other buildings. Many of our own methods had their origins in these 15th-century practices. A final choice comes again from the Uffizi: Totila’s Assault on Perugia. It is a very early example of an accurate drawing of an individual building (with a generalised view of city walls behind), and shows the church of Sant’ Ercolano (gothic, 1297–1326) dedicated to the patron saint of the city, executed here in 549 on the orders of the invading Totila. The extremely close similarity between this church as it is today and the record made of it in about 1461 in Gozzoli’s drawing begins the long tradition of the practice of using of architectural drawings to provide evidence of a building’s past history. Italian Renaissance Drawings: Fra Angelico to Leonardo, catalogue to the exhibition, Hugo Chapman and Marzia Faietti, British Museum Press, 2010, £30, ISBN 978 0 714126 68 5. IHBC seminar in the north There is an opportunity to examine conservation challenges for the UK in the context of the IHBC North Laboratory analysis Found at Penicuik House
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