International Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works

The current Council of the institute (2019-2020) is:

Officers:

• President - Julian Bickersteth (Australia)
• Vice-President - Amber Kerr (Lunder Conservation Center - Smithsonian American Art Museum USA)
• Vice-President - Austin Nevin (University of Gothenburg Sweden)
• Vice-President - Sandra Smith (British Museum United Kingdom)
• Secretary-General - Jane Henderson (Cardiff University (United Kingdom)
• Treasurer - Juergen Vervoorst (The National Archives (United Kingdom))
• Director of Publications - Joyce Townsend (Tate (United Kingdom))
• Director of Communications - Amber Kerr (Lunder Conservation Center - Smithsonian American Art Museum USA)
• Director of Membership - David Saunders (United Kingdom)

Ordinary Members of Council

• Alice Tsang (Conservation Section of the Hong Kong Leisure and Cultural Services Department)[1]
• Eleonora Nagy (USA)
• Helen Griffiths (United Kingdom)
• Rachel Sabino (Art Institute of Chicago USA)
• Isobel Griffin (National Galleries of Scotland United Kingdom)
• Satish Pandey (National Museum Institute, National Museum, New Delhi, India)
• Lorinda Wong (Getty Conservation Institute, USA)

• President Emeritus - Sarah Staniforth (National Trust, ret'd)
• Honorary Member of Council - Jirong Song (Palace Museum, Forbidden City, China)

IIC's Council attempts to reflect the geographical and professional balance of the worldwide conservation profession. Council members, including the secretary-general and treasurer, are volunteers, as are the editors of Studies in Conservation and IIC's Congress preprints. The institute has a permanent secretariat in London with a staff of three.

IIC co-operates closely with other organisations in the field, notably the International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property and the Committee for Conservation of the International Council of Museums (ICOM) as well as national and regional conservation groups.

IIC is a learned society and is also registered with the Charity Commission for England and Wales.[2]

In 1930, the International Museums Office of the League of Nations held a conference in Rome on the examination and conservation of works of art. Following this meeting, the Museums Office issued a series of publications on the subject. In 1932 a technical journal of conservation studies, Technical Studies in the Field of the Fine Arts,[3] was established by the Fogg Museum (Harvard University), under the managing editorship of George L. Stout. It continued publication until 1942.

The work of the Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives program and the repatriation of art treasures after World War II brought together experts from Europe and the United States. They proposed the revival of Technical Studies and the formation of an international body of conservators to continue the interchange of information on the care and conservation of works of art. Between 1946 and 1948 a series of meetings was held to discuss these proposals. Foremost among those involved in the meetings were George L. Stout, W.G. Constable (Boston), Ian Rawlins (London), and Paul Coremans (Brussels).

In December 1948 at a meeting of the ICOM Commission on the Care of Paintings in London, it was announced that a new international institute for conservation was about to be incorporated with offices in London and that its interests would be the scientific and technical study of the subject.[4]

On April 27, 1950, the International Institute for the Conservation of Museum Objects (which acquired its present name in 1959) was incorporated as a limited company in the United Kingdom.[5] Its aims were "to improve the state of knowledge and standards of practice and to provide a common meeting ground and publishing body for all who are interested in and professionally skilled in the conservation of museum objects”.[4] The institute was to be concerned with:

• The status of conservators, by forming a professional self-electing body
• Publications: abstracts of the technical literature, and original work with a scientific bias - the end of the "secrets of the Old Masters"
• Training, with the aim of raising standards.

The office was established with the help of a grant from the Nuffield Foundation. London was chosen as the "midpoint" between the United States and continental Europe. Office space was provided free by the Trustees of the National Gallery (London). The Institute moved to its own independent offices in 1968.

The membership was to consist of Fellows who were to be persons highly qualified in (or in positions of great authority in) conservation and Associates who were to be "persons anxious to promote the objects of the Institute". Later a category of Institutional Members was introduced.

When the IIC was founded in 1950, the Founder Fellows were George L. Stout, Rutherford J. Gettens, Richard Buck, W.G. Constable, Murray Pease, Ian Rawlins, Harold Plenderleith, Sir Wallace Akers, Helmut Ruhemann, and Paul Coremans. Others who joined in that first year included Arthur van Schendel, René Sneyers, and Sheldon and Caroline Keck. George Stout became the IIC's first president, with Harold Plenderleith its treasurer and Ian Rawlins its secretary-general.[4]

The IIC membership grew quickly. In October 1952 there were 62 members (38 of them Fellows) with 64 candidates for associate membership in process of election; by March 1952, there were 167 members (50 of them Fellows).[6]

• IIC Fellows are senior members of the profession who are elected by the existing body of Fellows. Fellowship of IIC is open to all members who are actively engaged in the profession of conservation. Fellows must be able to demonstrate commitment to the profession and to show that they keep up-to-date with relevant developments. Indicators include publications, voluntary service to conservation organisations, participation in conferences and training events, membership of other relevant professional bodies, and accreditation by a national organisation.[7]

• IIC Individual membership is open to those working in conservation and with an interest in conserving the world's heritage.
• Student membership of IIC is for those enrolled in a full-time programme of education, training or work experience under the supervision of a professional conservator.
• Institutional IIC membership is intended for museum and galleries, libraries and archives, conservation schools, research institutes and commercial firms.

In May 1952, the first issue of the IIC Newsletter appeared; this later became the IIC Bulletin and in turn was succeeded in 2007 by News in Conservation. In October 1952, Studies in Conservation began publication. IIC Abstracts, an international journal of abstracts of the technical literature and the forerunner of Art and Archaeology Technical Abstracts, was first published in 1955. With changing editorship, it ran for five volumes ending with Vol.5, no.4 (Autumn 1965). In 2000, the first volume of the annual Reviews in Conservation was published and this was published until Vol. 10 in 2009..

In 1961, with the help of a grant from the Gulbenkian Foundation, the IIC held its first international conference. That meeting, in Rome, was attended by 150 people, and the papers were published by Butterworths under the title Recent Advances in Conservation.[10] Subsequently, conferences have been held at two- or three-year intervals with published preprints on a topic of current interest. Past conferences are:

In 2011 IIC instigated its Student & Emerging Conservator Conference series. These events are aimed at helping recent graduates and those still studying conservation to develop their skills and gain valuable career insights. They offer invaluable networking opportunities and panel discussions with webcasts, studio visits and a lively social programme.

The first conference in this series was

• Conservation: Futures and Responsibilities (London 2011)

This was followed by:

• Conservation: Obstacles or Opportunities? (Copenhagen, 2013)
• Conservation: Making the Transition (Warsaw 2015)
• Head, Hands & Heart (Bern, 2017)
• The Conservator's Reflection (Cologne, 2019)
• The Faces of Conservation (Lisbon, 2021 Online)

IIC's Regional Groups began in 1958. Regional Groups are independent associations affiliated or associated with IIC. A Regional Group is required to adhere to the aims and objectives of the IIC as expressed in the Memorandum of Association. Its by-laws must be approved by the IIC Council and its officers should be members of IIC. The first Regional Groups formed were the IIC-United Kingdom Group (now Icon, the Institute of Conservation) and the IIC-American Group (now the American Institute for Conservation). There are currently Regional Groups in Scandinavia, Austria, Croatia, France, Greece, Italy, Japan, and Spain.

• Cultural heritage
• Art conservation and restoration
• List of dates in the history of conservation and restoration
• Conservation Associations and Professional Organizations

• Official website