Our Monthly Member Meetup is a series of hour-long monthly events that we’ll host every second Friday at 2pm ET. Topics may cover sustainability, private practice, volunteering, the wiki, emergency planning, introductions to our various committees and groups, and more. Our goal is to offer you a social outlet and way to connect with other members. We welcome suggestions for topics and guest hosts! Send us your ideas at membership@culturalheritage.org. See past recordings at https://learning.culturalherit... and https://learning.culturalherit....

The Wiki Working Group welcomes AIC Wiki editors and users to an open discussion. Learn about new processes and improvements with the AIC Wiki, as well as technical hurdles we are addressing, then discuss your own experiences and ideas. This will be a quarterly meeting, and will be recorded for those who can't join live.

Join the board and executive director for a summary of our activities and financials and hear about plans for the future.

Join experts Travis McDade and Nick Wilding as they share case studies on library theft and book and manuscript forgeries. Both will present for 15-20 minutes each, then a robust discussion and conversation will take the final 20-30 minutes. This event is free for BPG members. 

Join the Wooden Artifacts Group for the inaugural session of its online webinar series. Dr. Adam Bowett will present on Exotic Woods and the Growth of Empire from 1600-1900. A discussion will follow with Q&A from the audience. 

This presentation looks at the way in which British commercial and colonial policy shaped the availability of exotic furniture woods to British furniture-makers. It is a story that runs in parallel with the growth of British maritime trade and the expansion of its colonial empire. Above all it was competition with other colonial powers – Holland, France, Spain and Portugal – which was the primary determinant of which woods were imported from which parts of the world, and at what date. Trade with North America is also considered, especially the development of timber imports from Canada and the United States in the 19^th century.

This event is open to WAG and AIC members for free. The Zoom webinar will have automated captioning in English. 

In this conversation Jae Gutierrez, Executive Director of the Image Permanence Institute (IPI), will provide an informal introduction to current research on sealed frame packages being conducted at IPI. She will also discuss how this research sits within IPI’s sustainable preservation practices research agenda. As part of a three-year, Institute of Museum and Library Services-funded, research project a total of 28 sealed frame package designs were created for laboratory testing. Variations in design allowed for both quantitative and qualitative analysis. Experimental data was evaluated to understand the effectiveness of each design at buffering against external changes in temperature and relative humidity. Additionally, qualitative assessments were conducted of the reusability of sealed frame package materials. This research is ongoing, and the laboratory data is still being processed. Therefore, final conclusions will not be shared during this conversation, but trends and generalizations of lessons learned will be discussed.

Introducing Climate Resilience Resources for Cultural Heritage, a new resource created by FAIC in partnership with the National Endowment for the Humanities and Environment and Culture Partners.

Webinar #1: Making the Case for Climate Resilience: How Cultural Heritage Can Lead the Way 

Join us for an introduction to the Climate Resilience Resources for Cultural Heritage (CRR), a new resource created by FAIC in partnership with the National Endowment for the Humanities and Environment and Culture Partners. CRR is a suite of free resources that enables those who care for cultural resources in their communities to plan for and respond to climate change’s impacts. This series, tailored to cultural heritage stewards will walk through the importance of building climate resilience and how to do so using the three components to support collaborative planning efforts among cultural resources and communities.

Webinar #2: Location, Location, Location: Assessing and Interpreting Risk of Climate-Related Hazards

The second webinar of the Building Climate Resilience for Cultural Heritage webinar series will be introduced to the assessment tools including the interactive mapping tool and site risk vulnerability assessment survey.

-       Why the need for another interactive Map? What makes this resource different and how it is relevant to you.

-       Location, Location, Location: Using information from the interactive map tool in the site risk vulnerability assessment survey.

Our Equity & Inclusion Committee is launching a new series of conversational interviews with conservators and cultural caretakers advancing DEIA principles forward, changing the way we think about and practice cultural heritage preservation. Our first conversation will be March 21 at 2pm ET / 11am PT.

We are excited to welcome Professor Fernando Dominguez Rubio, Associate Professor in the Department of Communication, University of California, San Diego, for the inaugural event. His work on ecologies of care, meaning and imagination intersect with conservation in a number of ways.

Free for members. All sessions will be recorded and available to AIC members and shared after the live session through the Equity and Inclusion in Conservation online community and the AIC Member Community. Registration will open soon.

Register for this module to access the AIC Wiki introductory training video. You will also have access to any additional training videos and handouts added over time. 

This online program provides access to talks that were presented during the in-person symposium that took place October 31-November 2, 2023, at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC.

For roughly 150 years, people have been accustomed to seeing photomechanical prints on a daily basis. Prints exist in a variety of milieus with multiple variations over time, use, and geography. Historic and contemporary examples are prevalent in museums, libraries, archives, and personal collections worldwide. Photomechanical prints were developed to fill many needs including practical and economical methods for mass reproduction, techniques to facilitate the simultaneous printing of images and text, increased image permanence, a perception of increased truthfulness and objectivity, and an autonomous means of artistic expression. They exist at the intersections of numerous disciplines: photography and printmaking, functional and artistic practices, the histories of photography and the graphic arts, and the specialties of paper and photograph conservation.

The program will provide an opportunity for conservators, curators, historians, scientists, collections managers, catalogers, archivists, librarians, educators, printmakers, artists, and collectors to share and explore all aspects of photomechanical printing. The resulting advancement of our collective understanding of these ubiquitous but under-researched materials will allow for new interpretations and improved approaches to their collection, interpretation, preservation, treatment, and display.

Content available until January 1, 2025.

Funding for this program comes from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation fund for Collaborative Workshops in Photograph Conservation and the Foundation for Advancement in Conservation (FAIC) Endowment for Professional Development. FAIC relies on your contributions to support these and its many other programs. 

Learn more about donating to the foundation.

Photomechanical Prints Symposium Planning Committee 

• Alisha Chipman, Photograph Conservator, Library of Congress 
• Martin Jürgens, Conservator of Photographs, Rijksmuseum 
• Shannon Perich, Curator, History of Photography Collection, National Museum of American History 
• Rachel Mustalish, Paper Conservator, the Metropolitan Museum of Art 

Consulting Committee

• Jon Goodman, Photogravure Master Printer
• David Hanson, Historian & Collector
• Erik Hougen, Master Printer/ Silkscreen Studio Director, Two Palms
• Steven Joseph, Historian & Collector
• Helena Wright, Curator Emeritus, Graphic Arts Collection, National Museum of American History