“Keyword” panel discussions are a component of Bard Graduate Center’s multi-year Cultures of Conservation initiative generously funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The panels bring together scholars and conservators to explore four conventional values in the field of conservation practice: of the material object; reversibility/retreatability or visibility of the conservation treatment; attention to the physical and conceptual integrity of the original item; and respect for the intention of the maker or artist. Across a series of diverse case studies, speakers will unpack these key phrases to reveal how contemporary conservation projects both channel and challenge standard approaches to object-based research and museological treatment.


The 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center have changed New York City as we know it. The physical remains of these attacks, both as architectural remains and physical artifacts, were conserved first as part of the 9/11 Memorial, and since its opening in May 2014 through the 9/11 Museum. The remains of the 9/11 attacks were preserved in a complex and multilayered conservation project that confronted, for the first time, not just questions regarding the conservation of material remains of a terror attack but also the ethical questions regarding the nature of conservation in a site of national trauma. The panel conversation will center on the key themes and aspects brought forward by the 9/11 conservation project.


PANELISTS

Zainab Bahrani
Edith Porada Professor of Ancient Near Eastern Art and Archaeology, Columbia University

Jan Seidler Ramirez
Senior Vice President of Collections and Chief Curator, National September 11 Memorial & Museum

Mark Wagner
Associate Partner, Davis Brody Bond, LLP

Steven Weintraub
Conservation Consultant, Art Preservation Services

MODERATOR

Ittai Weinryb
Assistant Professor, Bard Graduate Center

This event is part of our “Cultures of Conservation” initiative, supported by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.