Global Conservation: Histories and Theories

Introduction

Today, museums in Europe and the USA are under heightened scrutiny in light of increasing requests for artworks to be returned to their country of origin and growing questions about the appropriate display of ethnographic collections. Conservation practices are changing to include multiple experts to choose the most appropriate methods to preserve material culture.

However, while museums display artefacts from many origins and deal daily with complex conservation practices, there is no comprehensive monograph or array of vetted online resources about the legacies of conservation on a global scale.

Project Overview

Global Conservation: Histories and Theories (GloCo) will be the first academic research project studying the histories and theories of conservation of material culture at a global level from the sixteenth to the twenty-first century. GloCo approaches conservation as a set of cultural and technological practices that aim to preserve and give access to art and material culture.

GloCo develops an innovative framework centered around the study of a selection of objects:

• Mesoamerican featherwork
• Asian ceramic
• West African wooden sculpture

This framework is organized around key transversal concepts:

1. Forms and fragments
2. Surface and time
3. Visibility and vulnerability

Importance and Innovation

The importance and innovative dimension of GloCo lies in its broad historical and geographical scope as well as in its contemporary relevance. GloCo considers histories, theories, and forms of conservation within and beyond the West to restore a plurality of perspectives.

Expected Outcomes

We will publish:

• Four books (PhDs and PI)
• Three articles (PDs)
• Host two workshops
• Create an online polyphonic dictionary (PDs and PI) that presents a range of notions tied to various cultures of conservation.

These new definitions will become an essential resource for academics, museum professionals, and beyond. Thus, GloCo will reshape the current understanding of conservation through a deep rethinking of its histories and theories.