Peter Draper (born 7 May 1943), is an architectural historian who has, over his long academic career, specialised in medieval architecture with a particular interest in English ecclesiastical building, primarily cathedrals, and the relationship between the architecture and its social, political and liturgical functions. Latterly his research has extended to Islamic architecture and its influence on Western traditions.
He is Professor emeritus and an honorary life member of
Birkbeck College, University of London where he is currently Visiting Professor in the History of Architecture.
He has published numerous articles and books including ''The Formation of English Gothic : Architecture and Identity'', for which he won two prestigious awards; the Spiro Kostof Book Award from the
Society of Architectural Historians in 2008 and the Alice Davis Hitchcock Medallion in 2009, awarded by the
Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain.
Career
After graduating from
King's College, Cambridge in 1964, Draper went onto study for a PhD at the
Courtauld Institute of Art where he was taught by the renowned medievalist,
Peter Kidson
Peter Kidson (23 August 1925 – 10 February 2019) was a British Emeritus Professor and Honorary Fellow at the Courtauld Institute of Art, where he lectured on Medieval architecture, Medieval Architecture until 1990. In his obituary in ''The Tele ...
, whose "inspirational teaching", as Draper has said, motivated him into the study of architecture.
Draper spent his early career as a librarian in the
Conway Library at the Courtauld before taking up a position as lecturer at Birkbeck College in 1969.
He undertook this role, becoming senior lecturer in 1993, until his retirement in 2004 when, as professor emeritus, he took up the position of Visiting Professor in the School of History of Art and Screen Media at Birkbeck.
In 2004 he wrote the obituary in
The Guardian for his friend and colleague, the art historian
Linda Murray
Peter John Murray (23 April 1920 – 20 April 1992) was a British art historian and the Professor of History of Art at Birkbeck College, London from 1967 to 1980. Together with his wife, Linda Murray, he wrote primers on Italian Renaissance art ...
who specialised in
Renaissance art.
Draper was elected a Fellow of the
Society of Antiquaries of London in 1979.
Other
Peter Draper often takes his own photographs to illustrate his writing and, while he was at the Courtauld, he donated photographs to the Conway Library, whose archive, of primarily architectural images, is in the process of being digitised as part of the wider Courtauld Connects project. One of those photographs, of a
hoodmold
In architecture, a hood mould, hood, label mould (from Latin ''labia'', lip), drip mould or dripstone, is an external moulded projection from a wall over an opening to throw off rainwater, historically often in form of a '' pediment''. This mould ...
, has been used in the
Encyclopædia Britannica as an example of that particular piece of architecture.
Public office
First World War Cathedral Centenary Fabric Repairs Fund, member of expert panel, 2014
Commissioner, appointed 1 September 2011
British Archaeological Association, President 2007–10, joint editor of the Medieval Conference Transactions, 1978–82, Honorary Secretary, 1968-72
President 2000–4, Honorary Editor of ''
Architectural History'', 1985-92
Cathedrals Fabric Commission for England, member 2001-11
Fabric Advisory Committee
Southwark Cathedral, Chairman 1995–2008,
member 1992-2016
[Southwark Cathedral, The Dean's Annual Report, 7 May 2017, https://cathedral.southwark.anglican.org/media/1089/deans-report-2016.pdf]
Books
* 'Observations on the Conception of Architecture and its Realisation in the Medieval Period: The Kailasanatha at Ellora' in ''Mapping New Territories in Art and Architectural Histories: Essays in honour of Roger Stalley'', eds. Niamh NicGhabhann, Danielle O'Donovan, Turnhout : Brepols, 2021,
* ''The Formation of English Gothic : Architecture and Identity'', New Haven, Conn. & London : Yale University Press, 2006,
* ''Reassessing
Nikolaus Pevsner'', editor & contributor, Aldershot England & Burlington VT. : Ashgate, 2004,
* ''Artistic Integration in Gothic Buildings'', eds. Virginia Chieffo Raguin, Kathryn Brush, Peter Draper, University of Toronto Press, 2nd edition, 1995,
* ''Medieval Art and Architecture at Ely Cathedral'', eds. Nicola Coldstream, Peter Draper, London : British Archaeological Association, 1979,
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Draper, Peter
Living people
1943 births
British architectural historians
Alumni of the University of Cambridge
Alumni of the Courtauld Institute of Art