medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture

Dear Paul,
This makes good copy for the media, but stained glass scholars have long been aware of this situation, thanks to the consummate scholarship of Madeline Caviness, whose volume for the British Committee of the Corpus Vitrearum Medii Aevi, The Windows of Christ Church Cathedral Canterbury (London: 1981) carefully charts the original glass and the many "restored" and made-up panels by its 19th and 20th century restorers, amongst whom Samuel Caldwell Jr. is certainly the most notorious.  In the freewheeling world of stained glass restoration at that time, this was pretty common practice, and there are lots of "fakes" about, both in churches and in museum collections.  At that time, the conservation of stained glass was, if one was lucky, in the hands of professional stained glass artists, but if one was not available, the local plumber (who knew how to work with lead) might be called in.  Conservation was not actually taught as a subject in its own right, and there were no ethical guidelines to follow.  Now, of course, stained glass conservation itself is a highly technical business which must keep to scrupulous ethical standards, and is taught as a university subject.  And the Canterbury glass is now in very safe hands, thanks to the stained glass restoration workshop at the cathedral, led, I believe, by Dr. Sebastian Strobl.
Cheers,
Jim

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From: medieval-religion - Scholarly discussions of medieval religious culture [[log in to unmask]] on behalf of Paul Chandler [[log in to unmask]]
Sent: November 12, 2012 6:46 PM
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Subject: [M-R] The Fake Medieval Images in Canterbury Cathedral

medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
From medievalists.net:
    http://www.medievalists.net/2012/11/12/the-fake-medieval-images-in-canterbury-cathedral/

In ‘Fakes and Forgeries in Canterbury’s Stained Glass’, a lecture given last week at the University of Toronto, Rachel Koopmans explained how these images came into the cathedral and have fooled people for so long. One of the faked images is known as the Pilgrims panel, which shows four figures on the move and has been associated with the characters of the Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer. The other is a portrait of the famous martyr and saint Thomas Becket, which some books have even described as being a contemporary depiction of the twelfth-century Archbishop.

Koopmans explains that both of these images, and many more in the Cathedral, were actually created by Samuel Caldwell Jr., who was the person in charge of restoring Canterbury’s glass for more than fifty years. During this time he created dozens of works and duped various church officials into believing they were genuine medieval images.

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Paul Chandler, O.Carm.
Holy Spirit Seminary  |  PO Box 18 (487 Earnshaw Road)  |  Banyo Qld 4014  |  Australia
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