Is digitalization compatible with cultural heritage, what is a real estate civilization, how to preserve the space era heritage? This, as well as French collectors and Russian UNESCO sites, will be talked about by the participants in the Cultural Heritage Preservation section at the Forum.
"This year the program of the Cultural Heritage Preservation section is again being formed around several main topics. Over the past year and a half, the world's cultural heritage seems to be moving away from us. Ancient monuments, temples of the Middle Ages, minarets of Islam, castles, estates, palaces — all this is gradually disappearing into virtual reality. Meanwhile, each monument continues to live the real life — sometimes it is tragic, as in Syria, or uncertain, as in Afghanistan. They are preserved, restored, revived by the real, not virtual people. And each meeting of such people is a return "from a copy to an original," which is so needed for everyone, but most of all for us, the specialists," says Vasily Pankratov, the Head of the Section and the Director of the Gatchina Palace and Estate Museum. — In addition, this year we are waiting for the representatives of the largest real estate complexes, castles and palaces from Italy, Great Britain, Sweden, Denmark, France and even Egypt — fortunately, this year vaccination makes it possible to invite all the "elite of the world real estate studies" directly to the Gatchina Palace."
The 3-day conference "Une vie de chateau. Life of the country country estate and around it" will be the central professional event. The conference will bring together representatives of the museum community, members of the European families who own hereditary estates, and private entrepreneurs. The speakers, including Walaa Eldin Badawy Madbwly Ali Badawy, Director of the Manial Palace Museum in Egypt, Marie-Solange de La Tour d'Auvergne, Vice-President of the French Association of Gardens and Parks, Andrea Bruciati, Director of Villa D'Este — Villa Adriana (Italy), Christopher Ridgway, Curator at Howard Castle in the UK will discuss how to preserve the real estate's cultural heritage in the modern world.
On November 11, the RAS Scientific Center will host a panel discussion: Collaboration in Space: Cultural Heritage of the Pioneers Epoch. To the 40thAnniversary of the First Flight of the Mongolian Cosmonaut J. Gurragcha and the 60th Anniversary of the First Flight into Space of Yuri Gagarin. Rich cultural and intellectual heritage of the space era origin and the first steps of a man in space will be the topic of the discussion, participating Jugderdemid Gurragchaa, the first astronaut of the Mongolian People's Republic, now the head of the Astropark in Ulaanbaatar.
Having made a lot of uncomfortable changes in our lives, the pandemic has also accelerated many useful processes such as new formats integration in the cultural institutions work. Digitalization stopped to be a distant goal; today few people in the world do not master remote and virtual tools for interacting with their audience. At the discussion "Modern Challenge: online projects in the field of cultural heritage" young professionals will debate what content will be in demand by the museum public in the near future and how to arouse interest in the cultural heritage among the new generation.
And the guest country of the Cultural Forum — France — provides an opportunity to take a closer look at such a phenomenon as collecting Russian art by the French. It is especially interesting to listen to the specialists, what they value in the contemporary Russian art, why our art still does not lose its attractiveness abroad.
On November 12, the General Staff of the Hermitage will host the conference "30 Years in the UNESCO World Heritage List of the first Russian Sites. Inevitability of changes in the new challenges era." It is a closing session of the international conference "Governance of UNESCO World Heritage Cities." Within the framework of the conference, it is proposed to celebrate such a significant anniversary as the 30th anniversary of inclusion in the World Heritage List of 3 outstanding Russian sites, to discuss strengths and achievements over this period, as well as challenges of today. Among the speakers there will be Sergey Makarov, Chairman of the Committee for State Control and Use and Protection of Historical and Cultural Monuments; Jyoti Hosagrahar, Deputy Director of the UNESCO World Heritage Center, Rudolf Zunke, Manager of World Heritage Site "Historic Center of Vienna" and others.
