This volume is the first comprehensive collection of texts on the conservation of art and architecture to be published in the English language. Designed for students of art history as well as conservation, the book consists of forty-six texts, some never before translated into English and many originally published only in obscure or foreign journals.
 
The thirty major art historians and scholars represented raise questions such as when to restore, what to preserve, and how to maintain aesthetic character. Excerpts have been selected from the following books and essays: John Ruskin, The Seven Lamps of Architecture; Bernard Berenson, Aesthetics and History in the Visual Arts; Clive Bell, The Aesthetic Hypothesis; Cesare Brandi, Theory of Restoration; Kenneth Clark, Looking at Pictures; Erwin Panofsky, The History of Art as a Humanistic Discipline; E. H. Gombrich, Art and Illusion; Marie Cl. Berducou, The Conservation of Archaeology; and Paul Philippot, Restoration from the Perspective of the Social Sciences. The fully illustrated book also contains an annotated bibliography and an index.

Nicholas Stanley Price is an independent consultant in cultural heritage preservation.

M. Kirby Talley Jr. is project coordinator for Conservation and Restoration at the Directorate for the Management of National Cultural Property in Amsterdam.

Alessandra Melucco Vaccaro is affiliated with the Ministero per i Beni Culturali e Ambientali in Rome.

“A treasure that puts in perspective a subject of immense importance.”
—Museum News

"Before compiling these 46 diverse articles, the Getty Conservation team considered more than 300 documents. The result is a scholarly collection that attempts to show the relationship of art history to art conservation. The readings, many of which might not be readily found in common sources, are invaluable not only to students—the group targeted by the editors—but also to art historians, archaeologists, and conservators already engaged in the trade. The opening essays on art appreciation, written by notables such as Clive Bell and Kenneth Clark, have been included to show the relationship between connoisseurship and the need to preserve the past. Subsequent readings discuss past restoration practices and analyze procedures used today, and the texts can be difficult. Still, this is essential for art and academic libraries."
—Library Journal

"An extraordinarily rich compilation that invites us to reexamine the whole philosophical basis of our profession. . . . It is difficult to imagine how this anthology of a unique intellectual heritage could be bettered."
—David Bonford, National Gallery, London