Call for papers--IIC Congress

Call for papers

"An Unbroken History: Conserving East Asian Works of Art and
    Heritage"
IIC Congress
Hong Kong
22-26 September 2014

IIC is delighted to announce that the 25th biennial IIC Congress
will be held in Hong Kong on 22-26 September 2014, with the theme
"An Unbroken History: Conserving East Asian Works of Art and
Heritage". For the first time, IIC is holding its Congress in a
sub-tropical region which brings its own, very particular problems
of preventive conservation.

Hong Kong, a special administrative region of the People's Republic
of China, is situated on the coast of the South China Sea, to the
east of the Pearl River (Zhujiang) delta. Much of the region is
hilly and maintained as nature reserves and Hong Kong's densely
populated and famously high cityscape rises from narrow areas of
land available for building, much of it reclaimed. A fascinating
cultural melting pot, Hong Kong blends the customs and traditions of
East and West: a crowded, busy city-state balancing the contemporary
and progressive with traditional beliefs and practices. Often seen
as 'China's window on the world', Hong Kong's museums, galleries and
heritage sites are testament to its rich history and traditions as
well as to its role as a point of exchange between Chinese heritage
and the cultures of the rest of the world. IIC is delighted to be
organising the 2014 Congress with the Leisure and Cultural Services
Department of the Hong Kong Government, who have overall
responsibility for the public museums, galleries and heritage sites
throughout Hong Kong. The Congress will be held at Hong Kong City
Hall, bordering the famous Victoria Harbour, which is an important
example of an 'evolved-Bauhaus' style architecture and will provide
a central, capacious and comfortable venue for the week.

The theme: "An Unbroken History: Conserving East Asian Works of Art
and Heritage"

Objects of art and heritage generally reveal their significance
through different senses: their form and appearance; the messages
and stories they contain; the knowledge and information hidden
within them. Hence, conservation efforts are meant not only to
assist the study of the history and the making of our heritage but
also to help us to appreciate and to revivify its beauties and
merits. Each form and artefact of East Asian art and heritage, in
addition to assuming a unique style and nature, carries an important
meaning from and testimony to the culture and history of the people
and the region that created them.

The IIC 2014 Hong Kong Congress will provide a platform to bring
together a wide variety of views and dialogues to address the
various areas of work, study and analysis involved in the
conservation of East Asian art and heritage. It will focus on how
conservation helps to retain or recover and then communicate the
messages that East Asian art and heritage carry, and will address
how the history or meaning of this art and heritage affects the
decision-making processes and course of conservation treatments.
Different conservation approaches, and hence methodologies, will be
discussed and examined, and will link in to the unveiling of
traditional craftsmanship, manufacturing materials and patterns of
use or previous restorations. With advances in technology, an
increasingly efficient flow of information and a growing awareness
of conservation ethics, more specific and sustainable ways to treat
art and heritage, as compared to traditional approaches, will also
be explored.

These different approaches to conservation may be applied to the
treatment of a wide range of objects and materials: Scroll paintings
and calligraphy; prints; textiles and costumes; wall paintings;
sculpture; furniture and lacquer wares; jewellery, ceramics and
metalwork of all varieties pertinent to the region. The conservation
of the built heritage, including historical and archaeological
sites, monuments and historic buildings with distinctive oriental
features is an important aspect of conservation in the region. The
intangible cultural heritage of a community, its traditions, customs
and rituals, its music, folk arts and crafts, has a value that is
incalculable, but it may wither and diminish inconspicuously, unable
to compete with the pressures of the strident modern world, if we
are unaware of its importance. Innovative approaches and methods are
required if we are to preserve the relics and objects which are
inseparable parts of the intangible cultural heritage and complement
efforts in its preservation.

The official language of the Congress is English, with the provision
of simultaneous translation of the proceedings into and from
Putonghua. Papers may thus be presented in English or Chinese.

Further details about the Hong Kong Congress are available on the
website of the Kong Kong Government's Leisure and Cultural Services
Department:

    <URL:http://www.lcsd.gov.hk/CE/Museum/Conservation/eng/iic/index.htm>

Call for papers

We now invite the submission of proposals for papers to be presented
at the 2014 Congress. We are looking for new and original,
unpublished work, relevant to the Congress theme and, importantly,
relevant to conservation. Multidisciplinary proposals are
encouraged. We are also looking for an awareness of the need for
ethical treatments. A requirement of submission is that one of the
authors of each selected paper must attend the Congress to present
that paper to the audience.

Papers presented at and published as a result of an IIC Congress all
undergo a rigorous peer review process. To this end, IIC Council
appoints a Technical Committee of international experts who will
make selections from the proposals received and selected authors
will be invited to develop the proposal into a synopsis as well as
to include not more than 2 illustrations for consideration by the
Technical Committee. Authors may then be requested to refine the
synopses as necessary, and the final paper synopses will be edited
for publication as the Congress Preprints by the Congress Editorial
Committee. Please remember that submissions should not have been
presented and/or published elsewhere before the date of the
Congress.

In order to include as many contributions as possible in the
programme and thus in the volume of preprints, it is planned to
publish a greater number of shorter synopses than has been the
practice in the past. The synopses and presentations will be
considered by the Technical Committee during and after the Congress
for the production of postprints; selected authors will then be
invited to submit full versions of their papers. Further details
will be made available later.

IIC invites you to submit your proposal for a paper in English in
500-700 words (up to 3000 characters) via the website,

<URL:http://www.iiconservation.org/node/add/abstract>

To submit a proposal in Chinese (600-800 characters) please see

    <URL:http://www.lcsd.gov.hk/CE/Museum/Conservation/chi/iic/submission.htm>

Please do not include any illustrations with your proposal
submission. If selected, you will be invited to develop the proposal
into a synopsis of 1000-1200 words in English or 1200-1500
characters in Chinese.

Further details regarding IIC and its past congresses are available
on the IIC web site

 <URL:http://www.iiconservation.org>

Just follow the link to Conferences and you will see the congresses
listed.

The deadline for submission of proposals is 17 May 2013.  You will
receive a response from the Technical Committee by mid-July 2013.

A call for posters will be made in May 2013.

Please contact us at iic<-at->iiconservation<.>org or
conservation<-at->lcsd<.>gov<.>hk if you have any questions or wish to
receive further information on the Congress.

Graham Voce
Executive Secretary
International Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic
    Works
3, Birdcage Walk
London SW1H 9JJ UK
+44 20 7799 5500
Fax: +44 20 7799 4961


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                  Conservation DistList Instance 26:37
                Distributed: Saturday, February 9, 2013
                       Message Id: cdl-26-37-004
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