REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT INTL COUNCIL OF MONUMENTS AND SITES’ INTERNATIONAL ADVISORY MEETING
REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT THE INTERNATIONAL COUNCIL OF MONUMENTS AND SITES’ INTERNATIONAL ADVISORY MEETING DUBLIN CASTLE
Dia dhíbh a chairde, it is a pleasure to be here with you today on the occasion of the 2010 ICOMOS International Advisory Committee Meeting, Scientific Council Meeting and Scientific Symposium. I am delighted to extend the traditional Irish welcome of “céad míle fáilte” to such a truly international gathering of experts in the field of cultural heritage conservation. I would like to thank Mr. Grellan Rourke, President of ICOMOS Ireland and Mr Peter Cox, Vice-President for the kind invitation to address you.
You picked an interesting place in which to gather. Dublin Castle has played host over many centuries to captive audiences of one sort or another, but in the 21st century at least so far, they have all, like you, come of their own free will. What is now a fine, even benign conference centre was of course once a place whose mere name instilled terror into the hearts of the citizenry. Now it’s just conference speakers who feel that fear! If the castle complex has its fair share of ghosts and grim stories it also has some of historic Dublin’s, oldest surviving architecture as well as some gems of Dublin’s legendary Georgian architecture not least of which is the building in which we are now located.
Dublin was granted the accolade of UNESCO City of Literature this year and those of you familiar with James Joyce’s Ulysses will know that its most powerful evocations of both culture and place are associated with this old Dublin heartland. These stones hold our heritage and though the world changes and landscapes change too, there is a guardianship that is required of each generation, to effectively protect all those elements of heritage which deserve our care. Each one of you has made it your vocation to safeguard and to showcase that heritage. The broad context in which you do that is always in flux, from the encroachment of urbanization, rapidly altering demography, the years of the building boom and the present years of more frugal resources.
Changing too are the national and international knowledge, skills and experience bases and ICOMOS provides an invaluable platform for professional networking and inter-disciplinary exchange between experts, national heritage services, museums, universities, local authorities, archeologists and architects and all those whose work impacts on the preservation of cultural heritage, including buildings, historic cities, cultural landscapes and archaeological sites. The opportunity offered by this conference is invaluable and we in Ireland appreciate the long history of leadership that ICOMOS has offered around the world. We are delighted that you have chosen Dublin for this advisory meeting and hope that its welcome and its atmosphere will set the scene for intensive deliberations that will eventually help all of us take the right next steps, the surest next steps as we try to accommodate the contemporary world and keep heritage at its heart.
The current economic circumstances, and changes in the fortunes of economies throughout the world, give a particularly sharp focus to this year’s theme - the impact of social change on our heritage. You will have noticed I am sure that many new buildings sit now alongside Georgian Dublin. They will form part of the built heritage of the future among them new stadia, concert halls, conference centers, public squares and landmark buildings that will endure long, long after we have overcome our current economic difficulties. Who can predict the ebb and flow of the fortunes of a city or a country over the centuries? No-one could hope to do so with any degree of accuracy yet there is a need to ensure that whatever the ups and downs, the known and the unknown, a common and unbroken thread of care for heritage will run through the present and the future, that it will have a structure and an exacting science underpinning it and will not be left to chance. So your presentations on the impact of social change on heritage practice can help to inform us about how best to protect our cultural assets - not just in good times but in challenging ones too and into the realm of that which is still unknowable.
There is considerable potential in the new initiative through which the International Scientific Committee is partnering with a wide group of Irish institutions and organizations, including Dublin City Council, ESB, the Construction Industry Federation, the Irish Heritage Trust and many more. This week’s events will allow hundreds of Irish cultural heritage professionals, contractors and crafts people learn from your combined wisdom and I want to thank the foreign delegates from the International Scientific Committee who are participating in this partnership process for so generously sharing their expertise and experience and putting them at the service of our Irish heritage.
That heritage is rich and varied. It has shaped our character and identity and is a source of real national pride and international interest for we in Ireland are custodians of fascinating elements of our common human patrimony. The island of Ireland is home to three World Heritage sites, Skellig Michael in the far South West - the Archaeological Ensemble of the Bend of the Boyne in the centre and the Giant’s Causeway and Causeway Coast up in the far North. They each provide us with layer after layer of fascination from the physical and geological, to the mythologies, folklore and lived histories that have gathered around them and travelled out from them. In the same spirit of wonder and appreciation, Ireland has also recently reviewed its Tentative List of potential sites for nomination to the World Heritage List and it reflects a diverse and fascinating array of possibilities. I know that representatives from ICOMOS Ireland played a key role in helping to prepare the reviewed list and I thank them for their expertise and advice. The hosting of this international meeting in Dublin complements Ireland’s World Heritage priorities and its focus on the preservation of our diverse cultural heritage.
Thank you to ICOMOS Ireland for bringing this important meeting to Ireland and thanks to each one of you for being champions and advocates of a way of thinking about the world that refuses to be overwhelmed by the frenetic demands of the moment and forces us to reflect deeply on where we place heritage in the present and in the future, so that we do not let ourselves become cultural orphans who waken up too late to what we have lost. I hope you also get the opportunity to enjoy first-hand experience of Ireland’s heritage and culture. I wish you every success with all the strands of this meeting; may you leave here with new ideas and new enthusiasm for preserving, protecting and promoting the world’s most significant sites and monuments for this generation and for the future.
Go raibh míle maith agaibh go léir.