XX. századi műemlékek és védelmük (A 26. Egri Nyári Egyetem előadásai 1996 Eger, 1996)

Előadások: - Suzanne van Aerschot-van Haeverbeeck: Recording and protecting the architectural heritage of the twentieth century in Belgium and especially in Flanders

ments" and the construction of new public buildings, was founded in 1835 — the year also of the introduction of the first railway in Belgium and on the continent; it was enlarged with ,,corresponding provincial members" in 1861 and a Sites section in 1912. In 1972 a State Service of Monuments and Sites was erected within the ,,Flemish" Ministry of Culture; it had to work out the basic elements for protection, conservation and restoration and thus assist the Flemish section of the Royal Commission on Monuments and Sites, which from then on worked with separated divisions for monuments, interiors and sites. As a matter of fact the State Service constitutes the predecessor and core of our actual Monuments and Sites Section, now included in the Administration of Town and Country Planning depending on the Environment Department within the Ministry of the Flemish Community. The Royal Commission is still involved on the provincial and regional level. In the Walloon Region the situation is rather simular today, although the whole process was slower: the Heritage Division, founded later, depends on the Planning Administration and is in charge together with the Royal Commission section ad hoc. The even younger Brussels Region also has an own Service of Monuments and Sites and an independent Royal Commission Section. This structure may seem complicated, but it actually works since each regional Monuments and Sites Section or Service has to take its own responsibility and defend its policy within its ministry and towards the Minister in charge. Each region developed an own legal instrumentarium as well, which is of course related to the planned policy and feasibility. Recording and protecting: a first evolution The evolution of recording and protecting the architectural heritage must be seen in this general ,,historical" and „administrative" context. Drawing up a list, firstly of art objects and ,,ancient buildings" of high value, was a task entrusted to the ,,corresponding provincial members" of the Royal Commission in 1861 already. In 1914 an overview list with merely the function and location of the most important

,,classified" buildings was drawn up and sent to the military authorities in and out of the country with the request to spare the inserted items, according to the existing international conventions. But this remained without any efficient result indeed. Despite several initiatives, it appeared that in the ,,goldon sixties", about 100 years later, the inventory did not develop much and certainly not according to a basic and uniformous methodology. The first law for the official protection of monuments and sites dates back to 1931, its first applications to the years 1934/36. As usual for the time, only the most important,

,,obvious" and ancient public buildings such as churches, town halls, castles etc., inserted in the wartime lists, were gradually being ,,officially" protected; sometimes only the oldest parts of those buidings got the status of ,,protected monument". In exceptional cases, urban ensembles, such as for example the Béguinage of Diests, were protected as a „Site" (1939). The postwar period did not add too much buildings to the list, even though this could have been related to a new temporary effort of the Royal Commission, in the late fifties- sixties, to set up an inventory in a few districts and the capital.