authenticity
Robert Kunzig, in February’s national geographic: The architects in charge of Notre Dame de Paris’s reconstruction plan to replace the forest of oak beam rafters that burned in a raging inferno three years ago… with a brand new forest of oak beam rafters! They do not address the irony, the nonsense, of rebuilding with wood after such a fire.
They plan to replace the lead roof that melted, sending a ton’s worth of lead particles up in smoke to settle within a kilometer of the cathedral… with a new lead roof! There’s dispute, apparently, about the lead’s actual impact on the environment, and the chief architect has determined that any possible health risk is worth taking. Guaranteed–nontoxic alternatives like copper or zinc simply won’t do — though just why is not addressed either.
Lead already covers the Panthéon, the Invalides, and other monuments, Villeneuve said; why should the cathedral be the only victim of “the madness of these lead fundamentalists”?
This is what a true last-known-state reconstruction requires, apparently: oak beam rafters hewn by hand the way our fathers intended, except for being roughed out at a modern sawmill first, because, well, that is a lot of work after all. Lead roofing, pinnacle of materials in 1850, and completely harmless we assure you, but just in case we’ll be filtering the rainwater that runs off it. Statues of the apostles restored, their copper refinished and smoothed, but not too smooth, because they “must exude authenticity.”
The two great rock–cut temples at Abu Simbel were cut into the Nubian mountainside by order of Pharoah Ramesses II ca. 1264 b.c. They stood, more or less — battered by the elements, buried by sand, and eventually rediscovered — for more than three thousand years.
And then, in the 1960s, the Aswan High Dam was built across the Nile. The resulting rise of Lake Nasser threatened to flood the temples, and proposals flooded in from archaeologists and engineers to save them. One idea proposed to just let the water rise and construct underwater viewing portals for tourists; this was dismissed. Instead, the temples were simply (simply!) moved.
Between 1964 and 1968, the entire site was chopped (“carefully cut” saith Wikipedia) into large blocks. These blocks were hoisted up and put back together in a new position above the rising water line. Put back together exactly as they had been before:
The single entrance is flanked by four colossal, 20 m (66 ft) statues, each representing Ramesses II seated on a throne and wearing the double crown of Upper and Lower Egypt. The statue to the immediate left of the entrance was damaged in an earthquake, causing the head and torso to fall away; these fallen pieces were not restored to the statue during the relocation but placed at the statue’s feet in the positions originally found.
architecture art authenticity ugh