Training in the Conservation of Paintings - Calouste Gulbenkian ...

TRAINING IN THE CONSERVATION OF PAINTINGS
highest quality and of great variety. In actual restoration, and
especially in the matter of scientific investigation and advice, the
Technology Department does much work for other public and private
collections, and provided this service before any other public
institution in this country.
86. If the Courtauld Institute Technology Department could be expanded
into an establishment of the size and scope of the institute
we have in mind, with staff and buildings adequate to the activities
which we recommend for it, it would seem to us in principle a most
suitable nucleus for a Central Conservation Institute which would
then be a separate institute of London University, closely associated
with the Courtauld Institute, and although it would share its library
and other facilities it would nevertheless be more than a department
of it. It would hardly be possible to investigate realistically the provision
of space which is likely to be made available to the Courtauld
Institute within the future building plans for London University,
in respect of a hypothetical scheme, but it seems to us improbable
that the present plans would admit expansion on the scale required
for the purposes of a Conservation Institute in the near future.
Certainly the expansion of the Courtauld Institute in Portman
Square which is within sight would not be adequate.
87. In the circumstances, therefore, we consider it more realistic to
assume that the Central Conservation Institute which we believe to
be necessary is entirely independent of any other institution. We
would wish merely to note here our recognition of the kinship
between the institute which we have under consideration and the
Courtauld Institute, and of the suitability of a Central Conservation
Institute to a university frame if, in the course of time, London
University should be disposed to adopt it. It has been a normal process
that independent institutions should be adopted by universities
- the Warburg Institute and Percival David Foundation were so
adopted - and this process continues. But we believe that the institute
which we recommend should be set up as a separate project,
and that its initial testing period should be passed unhampered by
the immediately conflicting demands of other schemes within the
university itself, which would be inevitable if it were to start its life
as part of the departmental structure of any university.
Constitution of the Institute
88. For our summary of recommendations and estimate of cost in
the next chapter, therefore, we have assumed that the Institute will
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