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Reshaping the future of art
conservation in India
EMPOWERMENT
Building a network of
art conservators
There are a thousand museums in India and only 1-2% have conservation decisions independently, as opposed to
functioning conservation labs and in-house conservators. following set procedures for restorative treatment. With
participants coming from varied backgrounds, the focus was
With only one government-aided Master’s degree in Art also laid on improving their writing, documentation and
Conservation and a handful of post-graduate diploma presentation skills so that they evolve as conservators
courses on museology, conservation, and curation, a practical capable of tackling complex conservation issues. As part of
and intensive training programme for art conservators does the evaluation process, each participant-conservator made a
not exist. final presentation and exhibited their work on-site, helping
them highlight their conservation e orts.
The focus is on short-duration workshops for the preventive
conservation of artefacts or heritage management, Eight courses have been successfully implemented, where 39
specifically on the conservation of particular materials like young conservators have been trained
paper, oil paintings, stone, or metal. in the conservation of eight di erent
The aim is to help the art materials. Shortly, the conservators
conservation sector in India to graduating from these training
handle its vast cultural heritage. courses will have raised the
standards expected of art
The Tata Trusts Art Conservation conservators, changing the way we
Initiative was conceptualised in 2018 approach art conservation as a
to lay a framework for art viable job sector and highlighting
conservation in India by focusing on the importance of a well-conserved
infrastructure and training. Spread collection as an asset for
across four years, the initiative any museum.
envisaged partnering with five
institutes across India in 2019 to establish new conservation Ajay Ananda Chougule, a participant-conservator in the
labs, upgrade old ones, and hire and train conservators training course in Conservation of Metals at Chhatrapati
through 3-month training courses in the conservation of Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sanghralya (CSMVS), Mumbai, shares
specific materials. The programme would also support the his experience about the course- “Apart from the
establishment of a Master’s degree in Art Conservation at an conservation practices, the history of metallurgy taught by
Indian university. the metallurgical researchers and conservation experts
during the course was very beneficial for me. It helped me to
The emphasis was to teach hone my skills further, as I work on the conservation of
the participants to critically weapons dating to the medieval period.”
think and make sound
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