The Permanent Display of the Single Parchment Membrane in Fluctuating Environmental Conditions

Parchment leaves are amongst the most difficult objects to display as they are extremely sensitive to changing environmental conditions. Despite the various proposals on a sound methodology for their display, few of them have been recognized as adequate for valuable objects.

Chris Clarkson is widely accepted as the leading authority in the field, and has carried out pioneering work on the display of single parchment leaves. He has developed techniques to hold parchment under constant tension in fluctuating conditions which are now used in museums and galleries worldwide.

This conference paper, delivered to an international audience, is an extension of that work, explaining both the methodology and its application to a particularly important object. The paper was presented in Ljubljana after a series of visits by Chris Clarkson who has been giving masterclasses on the treatment and repair of parchment for several years.

Christopher Clarkson is a renowned book conservator and historian, and a leading authority on the conservation of medieval manuscripts. He graduated from the Royal College of Art, London in 1964, and then trained for many years under S.M. Cockerell (Cambridge, England) and later, with Roger Powell. He has taught graphic design, wood engraving, and fine bookbinding at leading London art colleges.

In 1972, he moved to the United States, where he assisted in the design and establishment of the first conservation facility for special collections at the Library of Congress in Washington DC. He has worked extensively on the collections of major museums such as the Smithsonian Institution (Washington), the Walters Art Gallery (Baltimore), as well as the The National Gallery of Art in London. In 1979 he returned to England to work at the Bodleian Library, Oxford where he organised and managed the Book and Manuscript Programmes for Oxford University. From 1987 onwards, Clarkson ran an internship training program on the conservation of books and manuscripts at the Edward James Foundation in West Sussex.

Since 1998 he has focused on his private practice in Oxford and is presently a conservation consultant to the Bodleian Library, Hereford Cathedral Mappa Mundi & Chained Library. In 2004 he won the Plowden Gold Medal, a prestigious annual award to recognise the most significant recent contribution to the advancement of the conservation profession.

Current Research

Recent projects include the Fox Talbots album No. 2; working with the St. Catherine's Library Conservation team at Camberwell College of Arts on the ongoing Codex Sinaiticus - 'New Finds' project; collaborating with the British Library on the forthcoming Facsimile of the Codex Sinaiticus; and private conservation of various medieval manuscripts, as well as Wordsworth Trust & National Trust materials.

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