Search Results (88)

The city of Warsaw, Poland, has endured significant damage throughout its history, particularly during World War II. The city was bombed in September 1939, and many buildings were blown up following the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising in May 1943. The Warsaw Uprising in August and September 1944 led to further destruction from artillery bombardments and fires. Even after the surrender and civilian evacuation in October 1944, additional demolitions occurred, leaving almost 90% of Warsaw in ruins. Despite ongoing efforts to rebuild the city, many landmarks could not be fully reconstructed. However, invaluable historical archives preserve remnants of Warsaw’s rich history. To reconstruct 3D models of pre-war buildings in Warsaw, a methodology was developed that integrates cartographic materials, spatial data, and results from tachymetric measurements. Historical maps, terrestrial and aerial photographs, and architectural blueprints from the National Archives in Warsaw were used to propose three distinct approaches to 3D modeling. Notable structures such as the Grand Synagogue, the Kamienica Theater building, and the Tłomackie buildings were selected for 3D modeling. These buildings either were destroyed or endured significant damage during the war. The 3D modeling process involved meticulous processing and calibrating of historical photographs alongside tachymetric surveying for accurate measurements. The proposed methodology showcases the feasibility of recreating 3D renderings of historical edifices, even those lost to time, utilizing archival cartographic data and spatial information from diverse sources. By leveraging cartographic heritage with digital advancements, a unique perspective on Warsaw’s narrative can be gained, enriching the understanding of its past for both residents and professionals such as historians, archivists, and cartographers. Full article

This paper presents a comprehensive study of the application of AI-driven inpainting techniques to the restoration of historical photographs of the Czech city Most, with a focus on restoration and reconstructing the lost architectural heritage. The project combines state-of-the-art methods, including generative adversarial networks (GANs), patch-based inpainting, and manual retouching, to restore and enhance severely degraded images. The reconstructed/restored photographs of the city Most offer an invaluable visual representation of a city that was largely destroyed for industrial purposes in the 20th century. Through a series of blind and informed user tests, we assess the subjective quality of the restored images and examine how knowledge of edited areas influences user perception. Additionally, this study addresses the technical challenges of inpainting, including computational demands, interpretability, and bias in AI models. Ethical considerations, particularly regarding historical authenticity and speculative reconstruction, are also discussed. The findings demonstrate that AI techniques can significantly contribute to the preservation of cultural heritage, but must be applied with careful oversight to maintain transparency and cultural integrity. Future work will focus on improving the interpretability and efficiency of these methods, while ensuring that reconstructions remain historically and culturally sensitive. Full article

Arcangelo Scacchi (1810–1893) one of the greatest Italian geoscientists known worldwide, especially for his contributions in the fields of mineralogy and volcanology, dedicated his early years to malacological and zoological works. This paper aims to pay homage to a lesser-known side of the scientist, focusing on a malacological work related to fossils from his hometown, Gravina, in Puglia (southern Italy), located within the boundaries of the MurGEopark, which is aspiring to become a UNESCO Global Geopark (aUGGp), and at the border of Parco Nazionale dell’Alta Murgia (Alta Murgia National Park). Among others, Arcangelo Scacchi described 16 new species of molluscs but his precious collection, hosted in Naples, in the Real Museo Mineralogico (Royal Mineralogical Museum), now Museo di Paleontologia dell’Università di Napoli Federico II (Museum of Palaeontology of the University of Naples Federico II), was partly lost. In recent years, research has allowed the resampling of some species he described for the first time in 1835. Starting from this material, the figure of Scacchi was highlighted to the public through the temporal exhibitions and the use of 3D digital models of these resampled fossils. This activity represents: (i) a tribute to the first modern geoscientist who worked in the area of the MurGEopark, (ii) an instrument to preserve palaeontological remains of international importance, and (iii) a public opportunity to know this kind of geocultural heritage enriching the potential examples of (geo)dissemination in the MurGEopark. Full article

Facing substantial challenges due to rapid urbanization and socio-political shifts, the urban identities of our cities are in a state of significant transformation. This study explored the dynamic evolution of Damascus’s urban identity over distinct historical periods, employing a multi-dimensional methodology, which integrated spatial assessments, observational data from urban planners, and historical analyses. The findings revealed a transition from a stable urban identity in the pre-colonial period, to fragmented and, eventually, lost states in the post-colonial era. This study has underscored the need for strategic interventions to preserve the city’s identity amidst modernization pressures, providing valuable insights for urban planners and policymakers. The findings underscore the pressing need for strategic, context-sensitive interventions that can restore and revitalize Damascus’s unique urban identity, contributing to a broader discourse on the sustainable preservation of the cultural heritage in historic cities facing modernization pressures. Full article

This paper analyses the indigenization or Koreanization of Protestantism in South Korea in the late 20th century through a study of an original messianic and millenarian movement, Victory Altar. The group was founded in 1981 by Cho Hee-Seung in the biblical tradition, with references to Korean spiritual traditions as well. Its most salient feature is the self-consecration of Cho Hee-Seung as “Victor Christ and God”, the unique universal Messiah. In order to show the correlation between this spiritual movement, Protestantism, and Korean culture, I survey the recent history of South Korea and its staunch nationalism largely spurred by Protestant missionaries at the turn of the 20th century. I then present the core teachings of Cho the Messiah: the biological immortality of neohumans, the Hebrew genealogy of the Koreans thanks to the saga of the Lost Tribe of Dan from Israel to Korea, and his major vows to protect South Korea. An assessment of the heritage of Protestantism in this movement is then offered through the perspective of post-colonialism since Victory Altar sees itself and its Messiah/God as far superior to the God and Messiah of the Western powers that brought Christianity to Korea without really understanding it. Full article

Recent development of methodologies based on digital twins through 3D scanning and 3D printing has increased over the past decade, offering new possibilities in manufacturing, production and scaling of models’ applications. However, there are few examples of the application of model digitization technologies for the restoration of ceramic-built heritage by means of 3D modelling. That is why this research focuses on the application of these advanced methodologies to the recovery of architectural ceramic ornamental objects in heritage buildings. Deteriorated ceramic pieces are selected and scanned during field campaigns using 3D scanning technology in early 20th century heritage sites in Seville (Spain). The aim is to create accurate replicas of these damaged objects by 3D printing with clay using non-invasive techniques. The study stands out for its practical approach and its implications for the conservation of built cultural heritage. The results proved effective for replacing lost or damaged elements in a heritage context. Once the investment in the necessary equipment and technologies has been made, the use of clay as a material for 3D printing not only proves feasible but also offers advantages in terms of cost and time savings for repairs compared to traditional restoration techniques. In the present investigation the production time of similar pieces using 3D printing took 6.3–10.9 h while traditional methods take over a week. The application of these technologies represents an advancement in integrating modern methods into cultural heritage conservation, opening new possibilities for the preservation of history and art worldwide. Full article

Resource-oriented cities are faced with the problems of the decline of traditional industries, exhaustion of resources, and wastage of space. Faced with these problems, urban renewal has become an important role and is widely used in the reuse of old and abandoned spaces. As a historical witness of the industrial revolution and urbanization process, coal mine industrial heritage not only has the value of material heritage but also carries rich historical and cultural information. However, with the adjustment of industrial structure, much coal mine industrial heritage has gradually lost its original production function and become neglected idle space in cities, and industrial buildings and equipment in these spaces have been abandoned or dismantled. The study takes the Wangfeng Mine site in Jiaozuo City, Henan Province as an example, combined with the urban development history and current situation of Jiaozuo city, it discusses the remodeling strategy of industrial heritage space from the perspective of urban renewal. Firstly, through case analysis, historical data sorting, and field research, the study integrated the historical development context of the Jiaozuo coal mine site and its impact on the urban spatial pattern, secondly, discussed the practical problems in the reuse process of industrial sites, and finally proposed specific spatial remodeling strategies based on the conjugation theory. This included determining how to deal with the three pairs of conjugated relations between protection and development, function and ecology, and history and modernity so as to make the spatial remodeling strategy of industrial sites more scientific and sustainable. To promote the sustainable and healthy development of urban industrial heritage space. Full article

Popular religion in China has been very active ever since the late 1970s, with the restoration of temples and statues, a rising numbers of believers, and people’s increasing enthusiasm for religious activities. Folklore, rituals and legends are also ‘borrowed’ to reinvent tradition to fit in the strand of intangible cultural heritage. Therefore, seemingly reviving religions are also going through the process of de-religionization. Based on my ethnographic work in a Chinese county, I attempted to understand religion’s role in constructing local knowledge and how religious practices are affected by urbanization as well as globalization. The revival of institutional religions like Buddhism and Protestantism comes at the cost of popular religion or popular religious practices. Local deities lost the battle of competing with regional deities, which led to the simplification of local religious knowledge, a decrease in the diversity of deities and the tendency of convergence in terms of deities’ functions and believers’ appeals. A once complicated celestial hierarchy mirroring the imperial dynasty has been replaced by a more universal understanding of either bodhi in Buddhism or salvation in Protestantism. Local knowledge is reinterpreted by these religious teachings in the name of a higher cause of morality. Full article

The American Civil War has been commemorated with a great variety of monuments, memorials, and markers. These monuments were erected for a variety of reasons, beginning with memorialization of the fallen and later to honor aging veterans, commemoration of significant anniversaries associated with the conflict, memorialization of sites of conflict, and celebration of the actions of military leaders. Sources reveal that during both the Jim Crow and Civil Rights eras, many monuments were erected as part of an organized propaganda campaign to terrorize African American communities and distort the past by promoting a “Lost Cause” narrative. Through subsequent decades, to this day, complex and emotional narratives have surrounded interpretive legacies of the Civil War. Instruments of commemoration, through both physical and digital intervention approaches, can be provocative and instructive, as the country deals with a slavery legacy and the commemorated objects and spaces surrounding Confederate inheritances. Today, all of these potential factors and outcomes, with internationally relevance, are surrounded by swirls of social and political contention and controversy, including the remembering/forgetting dichotomies of cultural heritage. In this article, drawing from the testimony of scholars and artists, I address the conceptual landscape of approaches to the presentation and evolving participatory narratives of Confederate monuments that range from absolute expungement and removal to more restrained ideas such as in situ re-contextualization, removal to museums, and preservation-in-place. I stress not so much the academic debate but how the American public is informed about and reacts to the various issues related to Confederate memorialization. My main point, where my premise stands out in the literature, is that, for the sake of posterity, and our ability to connect and engage with a tangible in situ artifact, not all Confederate statues should be taken down. Some of them, or remnants of them, should be preserved as sites of conscience and reflection, with their social and political meanings ongoing and yet to be determined in the future. The modern dilemma turns on the question: In today’s new era of social justice, are these monuments primarily symbols of oppression, or can we see them, in select cases, alternatively as sites of conscience and reflection encompassing more inclusive conversations about commemoration? What we conserve and assign as the ultimate public value of these monuments rests with how we answer this question. Full article

At present, there are limitations in the cognition of the elements of traditional village cultural landscapes, less excavation of the elements of production-type cultural landscapes, little attention to the layering of cultural landscapes in different periods and the correlation between the elements of different types of cultural landscapes, and insufficient research on the living continuity of traditional village cultural landscapes. In the context of rural cultural revitalization, it is necessary to explore strategies for the conservation and development of traditional village cultural landscapes from the perspective of living heritage. By interpreting the core connotation of the concepts of living heritage and cultural landscape, a model of traditional village cultural landscape elements and a framework for the identification of living elements are constructed. On the above basis, Chentian Village in Wuhan is taken as an example to identify its living cultural landscape elements, and to analyze the evolution of its cultural landscape elements from the dimension of “time-function”. In Chentian Village, a total of seventeen cultural landscapes were identified. Of these, ten were cultural landscapes with functional continuity and living heritage characteristics; three were cultural landscapes whose existing functions have changed significantly from their initial functions; and four were cultural landscapes that were inactive and have lost their original functions. Finally, this study proposes corresponding protection and development strategies for living heritage and non-living heritage of cultural landscapes. Full article

The traditional villages along the Wanli Tea Road carry rich historical and cultural heritage, holding significant humanistic and scientific value. However, with the rapid pace of urbanization and modernization, the inheritance and protection of the cultural landscapes in these traditional villages face numerous challenges. Based on this, this study focuses on Xiamen Village, a traditional village along the Jinzhong section of the Wanli Tea Road, utilizing the perspective of the landscape gene information chain to reveal the performance and genetic characteristics of its unique and regionally distinctive cultural landscape genes. The study provides theoretical support for the protection and inheritance of cultural landscapes in traditional villages along the Wanli Tea Road. The results show that: (1) The overall cultural landscape of Xiamen Village has been well preserved, with notable characteristics in environment, layout, architecture, and culture, demonstrating its rich historical and cultural accumulation, and offering high research and conservation value; (2) The landscape gene information chain of Xiamen Village plays a critical role in integrating the village’s cultural landscape. The landscape gene information elements and points express the village’s unique historical inheritance through regional culture and material forms. The “branch-like” structure of the landscape gene information corridors effectively connects the various landscape gene information points, while the landscape gene information network reflects the interaction between tradition and modernity; (3) The landscape gene information chain of Xiamen Village shows a relationship of coexistence between inheritance and change in its genetic characteristics. Although some landscape genes face challenges from modernization, their core traits have not been lost. The inheritance of the landscape genes is not static but adjusts and reconstructs within an evolving social and cultural context, reflecting adaptability and flexibility in response to modern demands. Full article

This article intends to highlight and reconstruct the relationships between humans (harvesters, woodworkers and master artisans) and non-humans (raw materials, tools, places, products, etc.) in the Barniz de Pasto mopa-mopa tradition. These relationships were lost when the focus came to be primarily on the objects, as happens in most popular art forms worldwide. This text is organised in ethnographic overviews: the home workshops of masters of Barniz de Pasto; woodworker workshops; montañas-selvas (Andean rainforest highlands) and mopa-mopa harvesters; until we reach the objects. Unlike a conventional article, it does not end with firm and immutable conclusions. Our reflections from our eleven years (2013–2024) of accompanying men and women artisans and collectors, during the process of including the traditional knowledge and techniques associated with Barniz de Pasto mopa-mopa as Intangible Cultural Heritage (patrimonialización) and its safeguarding, are always open for discussion. Full article

The theme of adaptive reuse, of great topicality for those who deal with built heritage, has its roots in the recent past, dating back to the end of the last century, when the problem of reuse proved to be competitive, for economic and cultural reasons, with respect to total demolition and reconstruction. Since then, various disciplinary and methodological approaches have been confronted with theories and methods of intervention, on an ever-expanding cultural heritage. This article offers a research perspective, with application of a case study of particular relevance to the city of Genoa, Italy. Adaptive reuse, in the text, is specifically dedicated to religious and sacred heritage that has lost its original function but has retained material traces and intangible values. The methodological approach, shared by several European architectural schools, is multi-disciplinary in nature and stems from the need to preserve material traces but, at the same time, preserve the spirit of the place, according to what is defined by the international community. The methodology and results are applied to the enhancement and reuse work for the former Genoa University Library, formerly the church of the Genoese Jesuit College (17th century). Full article

The Antarctic region harbors abundant natural resources that constitute a common heritage site for humankind. However, given climate change and global resource scarcity, natural resource management has emerged as a pivotal issue in Antarctic governance. Assessing the value of natural resources is fundamental and crucial for ensuring their sustainable utilization and conservation. This study attempted to promote decision-makers’ understanding of the Antarctic using nature’s contribution to people (NCP) and provide an evaluation of the value of natural resources in the Antarctic, thereby contributing to sustainable global development. It developed a conceptual framework for evaluating natural resource values in the NCP, which includes scope delimitation, type identification, and value assessment. Economic value assessments were conducted for key NCPs in Antarctica. Based on existing biological, physical, and economic data, our initial estimates indicate that the economic value of the realized NCP is approximately 2.46 trillion CNY, with regulating NCP accounting for roughly 70% of the total value. If the potential NCP in the Antarctic were realized at foreseeable scientific and technological levels, the total economic value would reach approximately 105.62 trillion CNY. Regulating NCP accounted for most of the total value, but material NCP accounted for more than 20%. Overall, the development of natural resources and environmental protection are two sides of the same coin in the Antarctic, and there may be trade-offs between different NCPs. With increasing human activity, many NCP may be lost in the Antarctic region. This study develops a new perspective on the valuation of nature’s contributions to the Antarctic. The evaluation results can provide scientific evidence for decision-making and management of the development and utilization of natural resources in the Antarctic. Full article

Starting from the critical premises that underpin the debate between archeology and architecture, some evidence emerges: sometimes, the musealization of buildings, “urban carcasses” and historical ruins—which are our legacy from the past—is even more harmful than that of any other artefact, for the purposes of their real understanding. In a country like Italy, which has archeological presences more than any other, architecture must contribute to overcoming the consolidated aporia that the Contemporary, conceived not only as a period but also and above all as its “forms and functions”, is structurally in opposition to the conservation of archeological heritage. Spatium ad Omnes, the project presented in this article, is an attempted exercise at “inhabiting archaeology”, that is, trying to re-grant inclusive usability to a historical fragment, which has lost the elements necessary for its liveability, paying attention to the reversibility of the project itself. The set of questions, doubts and steps preliminary for the design have been highlighted more than the final “figure” of the project: an essential form directly connected with the primordial principles of its constitution. Spatium ad Omnes protects and encourages visiting the complex, trying to offer new perspectives, new narratives and new connections that translate into the possibility of being—for those who visit this place—the protagonists of a unique experience made of history, memory and continuous discoveries. Full article