NEW AWARD FOR WORK IN AYUTTHAYA, THAILAND
On January 9, at the National Museum in Bangkok, a ceremony commemorated an award of $700,000 to World Monuments Fund from the Ambassadors Fund for Cultural Preservation and the U.S. Embassy of Bangkok for ongoing conservation activities at Wat Chaiwatthanaram, a seventeenth-century Buddhist temple in Ayutthaya, Thailand. The award is the second from the Ambassadors Fund to WMF for this project since a disastrous flood in 2011 inundated the temple, requiring urgent conservation measures. The latest award will support in-depth documentation, materials analysis, and condition surveys for developing flood mitigation measures, addressing urgent repairs, and developing a monitoring and conservation program.
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SCHOLARS CONFER ON SANTA MARIA ANTIQUA
Santa Maria Antiqua was the focus of a three-day conference at the British School at Rome in December. Santa Maria Antiqua: The Sistine Chapel of the 8th Century in Context explored both the history and evolution of the building from the fourth to the ninth centuries and chronicled the dramatic conservation and research program that spanned from 2001 to 2013. Scholars of history, religion, art, and architecture, specialists in the social history of Rome, and conservators presented a fascinating array of papers inspiring new interest in the pivotal role Santa Maria Antiqua played in Lateran history, pilgrimage routes in Rome, and early Christian iconography. Numerous scholars made clear that their work would not have advanced had the conservation program not revealed so many new details of interior decorative campaigns spanning the centuries.
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CRISIS IN SYRIA
Escalating violence in Syria since 2011 has had devastating effects on the country's cultural heritage.
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