UNIS/OUS/RI/016
22 October 2009
Global Seminar Marks World Day for Audiovisual Heritage
VIENNA, 22 October 2009 (UN Information Service) - Around the world, objects of the world's cultural heritage are threatened by neglect, vandalism, conflict, or disaster. The critical need to care for our audiovisual heritage will be addressed at an international seminar in Salzburg, Austria from 28th October to 1st November. In 2005 UNESCO proclaimed 27th October as World Day for Audio-visual Heritage, to raise awareness of the importance of audio-visual documents and to draw attention to the urgent need to protect them. The seminar in Salzburg - Connecting to the World's Collections: Making the Case for Conservation and Preservation of Our Cultural Heritage - will bring together 60 participants from 36 countries, including cultural leaders, conservation and preservation specialists from museums, libraries, and conservation training institutions, and cultural policy makers.
The seminar is being co-sponsored by the Salzburg Global Seminar and the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) in Washington D.C. and will build on the national initiative - Connecting to Collections: A Call to Action - launched by IMLS in the United States in 2005. Participants will draw up recommendations for protecting collections around the world and will address questions related to the identification of the greatest risks to our collections, the resources needed to secure minimal conservation standards, effective emergency preparedness planning, and the opportunities presented by new technologies and digitization. Strategies will be developed to enable cultural heritage institutions to make a better case for conservation to policy makers and private donors, and to garner public support for making better conservation and preservation a priority and a reality.
To follow daily seminar blog posts go to: http://www.iiconservation.org/wpress/
To follow the seminar on Twitter, please use hashtag #SGSConnect.
For further information on the co-sponsors: www.salzburgglobal.org and www.imls.gov
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