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International Archives of the Photogrammetry, Remote Sensing and Spatial Information Sciences, Vol XXXV, Part BS. Istanbul 2004 
3. HERITAGE PERCEPTIONS AND APPROACHES 
TO DOCUMENTATION 
Our understanding of cultural heritage is expanding, and now 
we believe that although Universal heritage values can be 
shared, archaeological and historic sites, as well as living 
traditions and other aspects of intangible heritage have value 
because there is people that is giving them value. The 
recognition of the human dimension of cultural heritage is 
perhaps the most critical aspect of this new paradigm in 
heritage conservation, which is the understanding of the 
multiple values of cultural heritage and of the importance of 
local communities in shaping the significance of this heritage. 
This of course creates a difficult gap to be bridged, between a 
rational and scientific approach to documentation and 
conservation, and a shifting concept of significance based on 
changing values and perceptions. 
There are also other practical issues to take into consideration, 
and they are presented in no particular order: 
— the issue of cost of documentation: the wrong 
perception is that documentation is expensive and a 
luxury item, to be done only if there is enough time 
and money available 
— the idea that the use of electronic means improves 
documentation. In reality electronic tools improve the 
speed of data collection, not its quality, which 
depends on the operators’ skills and experience, not 
the tools 
— the obsession with accuracy and precision, which is 
often the cause for increase in costs without obtaining 
real benefits 
— the lack of training in documentation and survey 
among heritage professionals, which causes either 
documentation to be dropped or reduced in scale in 
conservation projects, or on the contrary to be 
allocated excessive resources and to become more 
important than the conservation itself. 
All this creates difficult operating conditions for the 
documentation process, as it becomes unmanageable under 
financial, human resources, and technical capabilities 
parameters. 
4. CIPA TODAY 
The evolution of CIPA from a technical forum dedicated to the 
photogrammetry of historic monuments to an organization that 
debates theoretical and practical issues of documentation of 
cultural heritage is a positive trend. In providing various forms 
of assistance in identifying and selecting appropriate tools for 
heritage documentation, CIPA offers the opportunity to 
conservation professionals to compare and discuss methods and 
approaches. The message that CIPA sends out today is that 
there is no one size fits all solution, and that documentation 
projects do not need to be technological displays in order to 
achieve good results. So, while CIPA is rightly open to 
exploring and testing new technologies, it is also dedicated to 
the improvement of traditional and low cost methods. We 
believe that it is this balanced approach to documentation and 
its problems that makes CIPA a respected forum, demonstrated 
also by the quality of its congresses. The fact that CIPA is an 
international committee of both ICOMOS and ISPRS makes the 
organization open to both a technical audience and one more 
dedicated to the conservation. The ICOMOS audience was for 
à long time intimidated by the technical and technological 
Jargon displayed in the organization, but the recognition of this 
841 
gap and of the potential benefit of listening more carefully to 
the questions and problems of the “conservators” has allowed 
CIPA to grow out of its technical framework and improve its 
image with the ICOMOS side of its audience. 
5. CONCLUSION 
All these are positive trends, but there is still work to be done to 
improve outreach and the spreading of documentation 
consciousness among heritage practitioners. As we said at the 
beginning, many of the disasters affecting heritage today could 
be avoided with more and better documentation of our cultural 
heritage, thus the development of rapid and low-cost assessment 
methods for cultural heritage are highly desirable and would 
certainly increase the profile of our organization. In the same 
direction would go the development of documentation methods 
as part of risk preparedness in sites and museums. Besides 
playing the role of an organization where ideas are compared 
and discussed, CIPA could also increase its existing, but not 
still completely developed role of an organization that can bring 
together institutions to share knowledge and experience on 
specific problems. The biggest challenge ahead however is 
how to document sites and monuments not only in their 
physical but also in their intangible aspects, and how to develop 
meaningful ways to document “values” and feelings about a 
place. 
Through partnerships and parallel initiatives such as RecorDIM, 
CIPA is demonstrating vitality and willingness to work with 
heritage professionals and technical experts and we hope that 
this positive trend will continue to bear its fruits. 
The technology is however one part of the documentation and 
conservation process, and most probably the easiest to solve. 
Without the collective will and supporting local and 
international legal power to implement these programs’ the task 
ahead still remains difficult.