***Shanghai 上海 7-12 November 2010***      

          A Better City: the contribution of the city museum

          to the improvement of the  urban condition

       迈向更美好的城市 城市博物馆让城市生活更美好

        Our fifth annual conference will be part of ICOM's 22nd

        triennial conference. Registration is already open so

        please check out these web sites: English: en 

        French: fr   Spanish: es    The sites have an outline

        programme and details of local hotels. Invited speakers

        include Amartya Sen and Umberto Eco.

        Our own outline programme is at Draft programme

        We are now calling for papers - see Call for papers

        Here you will also find a detailed account of the

        discussions we envisage around our theme.

        The Chinese version is at Call chinese

        徵求论文 Call chinese

       In addition, UNESCO's magazine World Heritage No. 55

        contains some relevant articles. For example: Historic

        Cities - back to the future by the late H. Peter Oberland,

        one of the founders of UN HABITAT; historic cities and

        urban growth; social inclusion in urban settings. Those of

        you who were at our Vienna conference might also like to

        see the article on contemporary Vienna.

        See www.unesco.org      

        Our organiser is Dr Lan Zhang , the Director of the

        Shanghai History Museum, and his colleague Baofang

        Hu. There will be a full range of tours arranged by

        ICOM China, but we will have our own tour to Hanzhou

        and its City Museum. Hanzhaou is 150km south-west

        of Shanghai.  There will also be a reception at the

        Oriental Pearl TV tower which dominates Shanghai's

       skyline.        

        We have provided a short fact sheet on Shanghai

        taken from The Endless City edited by Ricky Burdett

        and Deyan Sudjic, Phaidon 2007 - essential reading

        for anyone interested in cities. It has three chapters

        on Shanghai. See Shanghai fact sheet   So...

         上海見

          Shanghai Expo en.expo2010

        CAMOC is also taking part in the Shanghai Expo during

        May-October, as one of ICOM's international committees.

        The theme, Better City, Better Life, is close to the

        interests of CAMOC, and the global observance of World

        Habitat Day will be held at the Expo, where the

        UN will have its own pavillion.

         ______________________________________

       City Museums and City Development edited by Ian Jones,

       Bob  Macdonald  and Darryl McIntyre, and published by the

       AltaMira Press is now out in paperback at $24.95, with a 15%

       reduction for ICOM members.  It is about cities, and ways

       museums of cities can contribute to city development. 

       There are 15 authors from the Sorbonne to Tatarstan via

       the UK, Germany, Greece, USA, Canada, Taiwan and Australia.

       To order on-line go to  www.altamirapress.com

       "A far more compelling book than others of its kind"

       Museums Journal, London

       "A unique survey of city museums from the five continents"

       Joseph Rykwert

      ________________________________________

        Now, to our 2009 Istanbul conference -   

Collecting   urban   history    in    the   electronic   age

CAMOC's  conference in Istanbul  28-30 September 2009

伊斯坦布尔 会议主题:电子时代收集城市历史 2009年 9月28-30日

Galata Bridge at the heart of a city of 12.6m people

Istanbul is by any standard one of the world's outstanding

cities. From the top of the Marmara Pera Hotel you have a

great urban spectacle: a sea of red roofs, plastered with

satellite dishes mixed up with the Golden Horn,the Bosphorus

and the Marmara Sea, the Hagia Sophia, the Blue Mosque

and domes and minarets everywhere. You can walk through

a UNESCO World Heritage Site or drive across a city of tower

blocks, gated communities and shopping malls: from the

sensational to the banal.  Once Byzantium, then Nova Roma,

then Constantinople, and now Istanbul. How can a museum

make sense of this mass of contradictions? It’s a challenge

worth taking on, and one reason why CAMOC exists.

This remarkable city, European Capital of Culture for 2010,

was the backdrop to our conference.   Organised by

Suay Aksoy, Director for Cultural Heritage and Museums for the

Istanbul 2010 European Capital of Culture Agency, it took

place on 28-30 September at the  Pera Museum.  Our

keynote speakers included Orhan Pamuk, the 2006

Nobel Prize winner for Literature and Professor İlhan Tekeli,

honorary member of the  Turkish Academy of Sciences. 

100 delegates came from 23 countries. The programme

is on : www.camoc2009istanbul.org and abstracts can

be read on Abstracts FV 

A publication based on the presentations will appear in due

course.  In the meantime, we have made a film about Istanbul,

cities and urban living -  and about CAMOC and what it aims

to achieve.  It was directed by two professionals, Jennifer

Portis and Owen Stephens. An edited version has been sent

to ICOM as our contribution to the Shanghai Expo in 2010. 

Click on this link to see a short extract:  CAMOC_Istanbul 

In addition, our Turkish hosts made their own short film of the

conference  -  go to www.youtube.com and put CAMOC

in the search box.

Shortly after our own conference, another conference took

place in the city organised by Urban Age based at the

London School of Economcis. The focus was on Istanbul

itself.  From their web site www.urban-age.net you can

download their publication Istanbul: City of Intersections.

It's worth reading.  You can also see an interesting film on

Istanbul with contributions from participants at the

conference on www.monocle.com. Put Istanbul or Urban Age

in the search box.

The Bosphorus and the Golden Horn define Istanbul as a maritime city

The only city straddling two continents - in the distance, Asia

The other Istanbul - the towers of Levent, the new business district

The metro system is small, but attractive and efficient

Istanbul is nothing if not diverse.  ©Owen Stephens SOC

The more familiar city - Beyoğlu, the traditional home of immigrants

The familiar city again - the Golden Horn

©Owen Stephens SOC

An older Istanbul which is fast disappearing

An alternative to the spreading shopping malls

An alternative to the supermarket chain. ©Owen Stephens SOC

One of the delights of Istanbul - all those independent booksellers

CAMOC dinner with the Blue Mosque in the background

Final evening

Suay Aksoy our conference organiser;Elena Koroshenko, our Russian/

English interpreter, Galina Vedernikova, our Chairperson and Director

General, Moscow City Museum Group; Irina Smagina, Deputy Director

Marlen Mouliou, Greece

Hugh Maguire, Ireland

Radka Banyalieva, Bulgaria

Mats Sjölin, Sweden

Gulchachak Nazipova, Tatarstan

Chet Orloff, USA

Jo-Anne Cooper, Australia and Hugh Maguire, Ireland

Annabelle Krause-Schilling, European Museum Foundation, Portugal

Some CAMOC delegates with the Hagia Sofia in the background

Suay Aksoy

Orhan Pamuk with the model of his Museum of Innocence

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Next conferences

2011 Havana, Cuba !

CAMOC will hold its 2011 conference in Havana.  This is a

very exciting prospect for us and Bob Macdonald, our

vice-chairman, who has been the driving force in securing

our conference, has written a background article on Cuba's

museums and much else in the latest issue of Museum, the

journal of the American Association of Museums.  It can be

downloaded at cuba

2012 To be decided

2013 Rio de Janeiro 

Rio seen from Niterói on the other side of Guanabara Bay

Os ingredientes do Rio, sua tolerância, sua aceitação do diferente, sua

vocação para o prazer e sua abertura de mente e espírito…

Hans Donner

Our Rio conference in June 2013 will be part of the ICOM's

triennial meeting. Our Brazilian colleagues are well advanced

in their planning and there is already preliminary information on

www.icom.org  

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The Cardiff Story/ Stori Caerdydd

A new museum dedicated to the past and present of Cardiff, the

capital of Wales, will open soon.   The Cardiff Story will be

based around a core collection of 8,000 artefacts and will be

housed in the building above which is in the heart of the city. The

project was one factor which lead to the setting up of CAMOC.

There is a BBC video on the project at  8408975

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Moscow City Museum

The latest design proposal for the new home of Moscow City

Museum

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The Squares of Europe

The Square: a European Heritage is a collaborative European

Commission project by a number of universities which aims to assess

the importance of squares for city identity in cities from Madrid to

Odessa.  The project has an attractive and informative web site:
www.placeeurope.net

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Museum of Copenhagen

The Museum of Copenhagen's response to the recent climate summit

in the city.  See www.copenhagen  It's one of the very best city

museum web sites.

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Some useful web sites.  See also our Links page

The World Digital Library www.wdl.org

City Mayors world-wide www.citymayors.com

City Mayors is a web based organisation which is about "celebrating cities

and promoting good government."  It acts as an international think tank

for urban affairs.  It is a mine of information about cities world wide, from

Lima to Tokyo.

World Association of Major Metropolises www.metropolis.org

"The main goal of the association is to better control the development

process of metropolitan areas in order to enhance the wellbeing of their

citizens. To do this, Metropolis represents regions and metropolitan

areas at the worldwide level and is recognized as a major player by large

international organizations such as the UN, WHO, the World Bank and

others."

The site has good and simple statistics on cities across the world.

Urban City www.urbancity.org

It contains "the world's most comprehensive calendar for events relating to

urban areas and urban issues."  It is a very convenient way of keeping in

touch with what's happening in cities across the world.

Making cities livable www.livablecities.org

"The purpose of the Making Cities Livable movement is to enhance the

well-being of inhabitants of cities and towns, strengthen community,

improve social and physical health, and increase civic engagement by

reshaping the built environment of our cities, suburbs and towns."

This is a very informative web site, with an interesting list of recommended

reading and details of forthcoming and previous conferences.

The Cities Programme cities

"The Cities Programme at the London School of Economcis is an international

centre dedicated to the understanding of contemporary urban society. Its

central objective is to relate physical structure to the social structure of

cities." 

It is linked to The Urban Age, a six-year sequence of international conferences

held in cities across Africa, Asia, the Americas and Europe between 2005 and

2010.

Shanghai Expo 2010 en.expo2010

The Expo will be held from 1 May to 31 October 2010, just before the ICOM

Triennial conference and our own. The theme is Better City, Better Life.

The Academy of Urbanism www.academyofurbanism.org

Based in the UK, the Academy was set up in 2006 to "expand urban discourse". 

The Academy brings together people with a diverse range of backgrounds who

are concerned with developing villages, towns and cities.

Urban Design www.udg.org

Urban Design is a journal dedicated to urban matters and is very relevant to our

work as a committee. For example the current issue has an article on world

heritage sites. 

Spur www.spur.org

San Fransico's centre for the improvement of urban living.The current exhibition,

on until 15 November is Agents of Change: Civic idealism and the making of San

Francisco. "Through compelling content spanning a variety of media--historical maps,

photographs, recorded interviews and an interactive multimedia installation-this

major exhibition examines the history of citymaking in San Francisco, and challenges

visitors to consider today’s urban issues in light of their own values".

The Arsenal,Paris www.pavillon-arsenal.com

"Created in 1988 the  Pavillon  de  l’Arsenal is the centre for information,

documentation and exhibition for urban planning and architecture of Paris. It is a

unique place, where information concerning urban development and architectural

realisations in Paris is available to everyone.As urban issues are in the heart of

current debates, it is essential to present these questions in an attractive and

pedagogic way, to allow citizens to be in the middle of the process of architectural

and urban creations". The Arsenal is a model for all museums about cities. 

Unmissable.

Project for Public Spaces www.pps.org

Project for Public Spaces (PPS) is a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping

people create and sustain public places that build communities.

 

The European Group on Museum Statistics egmus.minuskel

All the statistics on museums in Europe.

See also our Links page for other relevant sites.

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Briefly:

The Museum of Sao Paulo has a new and interesting web site:

www.museudacidade.sp.gov

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