York champions training in stained glass conservation
Posted on 9 June 2008
Stained glass has been a focus for academic study at the University since its inception in the 1960s. It is now the base for the British arm of the Corpus Vitrearum, the international stained glass recording project.
The two-year course, combining academic study and practical training, will take advantage of the city’s extraordinary collections of medieval and post-medieval glass. The city also boasts a cluster of the country’s leading conservation workshops, in particular the York Glaziers' Trust, which already has close links both with York Minster and the University.
The course will be the first of its kind in the English-speaking world
Sarah Brown
As part of their studies, students will have a five-month placement at conservation workshops in Britain, Europe or the USA. Potential locations for placements include the Cologne Cathedral conservation workshop and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. The two-year course will be run by the University’s Department of History of Art, in partnership with Archaeology, and will take its first students this October.
The course has been established thanks to a £123,000 grant from The Pilgrim Trust. The US-based Samuel H. Kress Foundation and the Headley Trust in the UK have given $60,000 and £50,000 respectively to fund scholarships. The course is also supported by a £6,000 grant from the Glaziers’ Trust, the charitable arm of the Worshipful Company of Glaziers of London, and £5,000 from the Noel G Terry Charitable Trust.
The course will be directed by Sarah Brown, currently head of research policy for places of worship at English Heritage, who will be combining the York post with the Directorship of York Glaziers' Trust. She commented: "We are developing the study of stained glass to meet the international demand for trained conservators specialising in the field. The course will be the first of its kind in the English-speaking world.
"The need to bring together higher education institutions, and conservation and heritage organisations has been recognised by the House of Lords, the Arts and Humanities Research Council, the Heritage Lottery Fund and English Heritage. We fit therefore into a much wider aim, nationally. The demand for this course has been signposted at every level.
"We aim to recruit up to eight students a year both from the UK and internationally. We wish to build on this by offering research degrees in the future."
ENDS
Notes to editors:
- For further details go to www.york.ac.uk/depts/histart/postgraduatemastainedglass.html
- For more information on The Pilgrim Trust, go to www.thepilgrimtrust.org.uk/