In light of the growing consequences of the ongoing war on cultural property, UNESCO is scaling up its efforts to support the digitization of museum collections and documentary heritage in Ukraine.
Producing digital copies of objects of cultural value, developing 3D models of cultural sites, or creating digital platforms to store and manage cultural property are effective and efficient ways to protect and preserve cultural heritage. Since the outbreak of the war, UNESCO has been supporting the Ukrainian authorities and cultural institutions to digitize their archives and collections.
In Odesa, UNESCO supported the development of a digital platform for the collections of the Odesa Fine Arts Museum. Necessary equipment has also been provided to the State Archives of Odesa, which houses one of the most valuable paper copies of the city’s cosmopolitan history. It is also thanks to this rich cultural heritage that Odesa has been designated as a UNESCO Creative City of Literature since 2019. More recently, the World Heritage Committee inscribed the Historic Centre of Odesa on the World Heritage List and the List of World Heritage in Danger.
In Kyiv, UNESCO has facilitated the transport of a specialized scanner, donated by the Government of Austria, to Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, part of a site inscribed on the World Heritage List, in order to digitize it vast archives.
The archives of the National Preserve ‘Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra’ contain unique written materials whose destruction would represent an irreparable loss not only for the cultural heritage of Ukraine but also for the global academic and scientific community. This includes descriptions of the Dormition Cathedral and Lavra churches, religious manuscripts and early printed books, as well as old inventories.
The archives of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra are an invaluable source of information not only on the origin and history of the World Heritage site but, beyond that, on the whole history of Ukraine and its intimate connection to this place.
The volume of documents to be digitized is daunting. By the end of 2022, about ten percent of all documents had been digitized and, due to the ongoing war, digitization work is progressing
Curators of the archival collections face difficulties such as power and heating outages, and regular shellings, which sometimes make digitization impossible.
Among the urgent needs of the National Preserve is the purchase of electronic equipment, such as laptops and memory and power equipment to allow information to be digitized, safely stored and accessed.
In the face of war, a year of action in Ukraine
