Műtárgyvédelem, 2002 (Magyar Nemzeti Múzeum)

Kovács Tibor: 200 éves a Magyar Nemzeti Múzeum

One of the main tasks of all museums is the collection of the artefacts of the past and their preservation for future generations. Conservation specialists play an important role in this. The expertise of the conservators, their dedicated work and their professional contacts with specialists working in other fields of museum activity ensures the preservation of the cultural heritage and its “social utilization”.The roughly fifty conservators working in the Hungarian National Museum play an important role in the preservation of artefacts, in the research of conservation techniques and in the training of new conservation professionals. Obviously, there remain many tasks for future work since the museum’s conservation activity - often linked to permanent and temporary exhibitions - resulted in a one-sidedness of their activity, focusing on the professional conservation of the museum’s collections containing several million artefacts. Adequate conditions for conservation work are provided by the newly built air-conditioned storage facilities, covering 2000 m2, and the conservation workshop in the museum’s inner courtyard, covering some 1000m2. The reconstruction of the already existing conservation laboratories is also underway.

One of our main priorities in the maintenance and the enhancement of the museum’s central role in this field, reflected also in the organization of the annual Conservation Conference and, also, in the publication of Műtárgyvédelem, a periodical devoted to conservation issues that has received widespread acclaim both in Hungary and abroad.

dr. Tibor Kovács Director

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