Educating Conservators for Lifelong Commitment

This research develops from the perceived need within the profession of a conservation education that encourages cultural sensitivity and a cooperative, flexible and reflective approach to practice. The focus of the paper is on postgraduate study. It explores the ways in which a series of museum-based reflective activities can be used to encourage students to examine their own beliefs and assumptions and explore ideas about cultural values within their peer group and the wider community. The reflective learning journals, introduced by me into the conservation studio and used as educational tools in my previous research are here even more central to the work. A range of student writing is analysed to provide evidence of a deepening understanding of the wider context of conservation in contemporary life and of a deepening commitment to the conservation profession’s core values.

Eve Graves

Research Interests

Museology and Conservation, Human Values, Meaning and Material Culture, Intangible Heritage, Intercultural Communication, Pedagogy

Profile

Eve Graves studied philosophy at the University of York between 1967 - 1972, followed by a further two years of doctoral research at the University of Essex (1972-74). Her academic career spans over 30 years, during which she has held numerous teaching positions, ranging from Guest Lecturer (University of Essex 1974; Goldsmiths College, 1988; Byam Shaw School of Art, 1989; The Temenos Academy at The Prince of Wales Institute, 1997) to Course Director (BA History of Drawing & Printmaking, CCA, 1990-95), Theory Studies Co-ordinator (Historical and Cultural Studies for conservation courses, CCA, 1998 - 00) and Disability Representative (CCA, 1998 - present). She has recently completed a Postgraduate Diploma in Learning and Teaching in Art, Design and Communication (CLTAD, 2002) and in 2004, she further qualified with a PDAF Award, Supervising Postgraduate Research: Supervising research degrees for professionals in art, design and communication.

Current Research

My research brings together conservation and material culture studies. I am interested in the ways in which human values become embedded within cultural landscapes and materials and the ways in which these values are revealed and preserved. Working within conservation I am interested in the ways in which these values can be explored and communicated to inform conservation education and professional decision making and so benefit the public and the profession.

My research operates in three principal areas:

1.Text-based

Using conservation/museology/heritage publications (and job descriptions) to explore changing attitudes (overt and implied) to tangible and intangible heritage – to assess implications for conservation theory and the teaching of ethics.

2. Pedagogic Action Research with conservation students

A series of learning projects to explore student ideas about meanings and values and their preservation and communication.

3.MATAR - Materials and the Arts Research Centre

The compilation of a data base for materials/tools/processes that are seen as possessing cultural/spiritual values and thus impinge on conservation decision making."