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History is Young Again BY ANTHONY BURKE, PROFESSOR OF ARCHITECTURE
Anthony Burke argues that we live in a time of radical change for all things heritage. He claims that history – at least the way we understand it to construct our heritage – is young once again. Here is an edited version of Anthony's keynote at this year’s Heritage Awards. History is an area of enquiry that is full of vitality and opportunity. For those of us invested in Australia’s built, cultural and natural heritage, we are at a moment of profound importance. I see three newly intersecting ways of understanding history that are re-energising the term ‘heritage’ and creating incredible opportunities for our field and our shared cultural project. The first is the growing appreciation of Indigenous perspectives of country, care, and design process that embrace a fundamentally different understanding of time and responsibility. The inclusion of First People’s perspectives in Australia’s heritage register extends our field of reference and scholarly enquiry from 230 years to about 80,000 – a 60,000% increase. This fact alone should be enough to convince us that there is much to gain by embracing Indigenous heritage and all it has to teach us. Then there is the growing partnership of heritage with the issues of sustainability and climate change. As someone interested in architecture, it’s not lost on me that “the most sustainable building is the one that is already built”. Science and economics tell us that it’s better to reuse an old building than to build a new one. This need for a far more sustainable approach to our built environment, coupled with a renewed investment in heritage practice 10
and scholarship, is incredibly exciting. To me, it’s the most progressive edge of design at the moment: making built heritage no longer an issue of fussy or contested historic preservation but of survival. The last point is the issue of media and communications, which with a few exceptions, have been only gingerly embraced by the heritage community. While official channels are slow to act, a groundswell of public voices has entered the fray on social and broadcast media, from community groups like Beaumaris Modern to a general surge in “Ruin Porn” (more tastefully known as beautiful pictures of crumbling buildings). A public fascination with heritage and new ways of engaging with it is well and truly on the rise. Our current moment is one of shifting contexts – culturally and physically. I suggest we need to seize the moment, seize the imagination of a newly emerging audience and general interest, and perhaps promote the reimagination of heritage for ourselves as a living and breathing question that is far from settled. Heritage can be less about where we’ve come from and more about where we are heading. Ironically, by reframing heritage from a conversation of preservation to one about the future, history becomes all about tomorrow. Aren’t we fortunate that history is young again? National Trust (NSW)
Above Anthony Burke is a Professor of Architecture and Director of the Master of Architecture program at the University of Technology Sydney. Anthony is a regular contributor to academic and popular discourse on architecture and hosts ABC TV's Restoration Australia. Opposite Judge's Choice winner: The Great Cobar Museum and Visitor Information Centre, Dunn & Hillam Architects (photo by Kathrine Lu).
