F. Mentényi Klára szerk.: Műemlékvédelmi Szemle 1999/1-2. szám Az Országos Műemléki Felügyelőség tájékoztatója (Budapest, 1999)
MŰHELY - Buzás Gergely: A múlt rekonstruálása avagy a tudós felelőssége
rounding us, and its makers and users were similarly average people like us. But what could happen with the honour of museums and monument protection in that case? These problems force everybody to take sides: one choice is the ivory tower of science the other is the mark of courting the favour of the public. But the essence is our mutual interest, as visual reconstruction is a means and not only a the means of representing results. When we try to reconstruct a building in words not quite clear results might not be taken into consideration, but in the case of a drawing we have to think about all possible details. This kind of reconstruction has been present from the beginning of architectural history. The expert of Hungarian medieval architecture is in the same situation as those dealing with antiquity for example: key monuments were destroyed and only fragments and archaeological finds have remained to us. The first attempts of visual reconstruction of important monuments have already taken place in the 19 th century, like Henszlmann's reconstruction of the burial of King Louis I. in Székesfehérvár. The most influential personality of this work was Kálmán Lux, the contemporary of Kenneth J. Conant, making the reconstruction of almost all medieval monuments in Hungary. The most outstanding figure of the post World War II period was Ernő Szakái. The research of Hungarian medieval architectural history has no other choice than following his way in the reconstruction work, as without this instead of architectural history we can have only a history of plans and stone fragments. The conference, where this lecture was held did not lead to a consensus however. The world around us does not understand our debates and would not be interested in values we defend. Seeing the damaging of monuments, visitors of museums never returning there, and searching for their past in rock-operas, Hollywood films and computer games, it is our moral task to defend people from the lies of tales. We have to compete with their colourful and exciting world. Authenticity has not long ago meant material authenticity. Museology and monument protection of modernism in the second half of 20 th century does not wish to deal with past, but only with the present, with the symbol of the past built in it. In the world of the end of the century present has lost its omnipotence and became part of reality. The power of the material has lost its importance and as it is ever changing, it is changing its form in the course of history as well. Consequently originality based on material truth is by no means authentic. Only the form could be authentic which could be observed and sensed by people of past and present. Postmodern age is the age of form. The responsibility of the expert preserving and investigating monuments of the past is great, as these monuments should be preserved mot only in material sense but in human minds as well.
