Letter from the Board, January 2010

14 years ago

Letter from the Board,
21 January 2010

 

Dear Colleagues and members of ICDAD,

we, the Board of ICDAD, take the opportunity at the beginning of the year 2010 to wish you the best and to inform you what your elected representatives of the international committee for decorative arts and design are planning for you this year.

2009 was a busy year for ICDAD. We arranged a successful meeting in Hannover / Germany and are making preparations for the General Conference in Shanghai in November 2010. We will also participate in an EU-Culture project dedicated to ARCHITECTURE AND INTERIOR DESIGN IN CENTRAL EUROPE IN THE EARLY 20TH CENTURY which will lead to an international symposium ICDAD is due to co-organize in spring 2010 in the Czech city of Brno.

In autumn 2009, we began to experience problems with the support of our web host and provider. The Board decided to change the provider and to apply a new policy, which will make the ICDAD homepage, our sole source of information and identity, a tool which can easily shift with changing individuals and nationalities on the Board of ICDAD in the future, without loosing the ICDAD archive. Having overcome these technical problems, we now hope to be able to offer you a new, more flexible, informative homepage.

Let me ask you once more to share relevant information with us and to send us all you wish to be posted via our homepage to our community and to a wider public.

2010 ICDAD is striving hard to arrange no less then three meetings and symposia for its members. And this is also the year for several co-operations with our sistercommittees. In April 2010, we are going to meet in the Moravian Gallery in Brno in the Czech Republic for a joint conference with DEMHIST. The meeting under the title NATIONAL – INTERNATIONAL Arts and politics in houses and interiors of the 20th century (Brno/Czech Republic, 21–24 April 2010, The Moravian Gallery in Brno - Conference Hall of the Museum of Applied Arts) will offer new insights in modernist house planning in Central Europe. You will find a call for papers on our homepage, with more information about the program.

As decided last year during our general meeting in Hannover, we will not only attend the General Conference in China, but will also organize a meeting for our members in the Netherlands in autumn. The title of the conference is WHAT IS MODERN? and we are thankful to the Boymans Museum in Rotterdam and our colleagues Mart von der Sterre and Ida van Zijl from Utrecht and Mienke Simon Thomas from Rotterdam for offering to host us and arranging the program. You will find a draft of the program on our homepage.

Last but not least, we have decided to organize a “joint venture of ICDAD, ICFA, GLASS and DEMHIST”, a conference within the 22nd General Conference and 25th General Assembly of the International Council of Museums, due to be held in Shanghai, China from November 7th to 12th. We hope for financial support from ICOM for this. The topic is FROM SILK ROAD TO CONTAINER SHIP: ARTEFACTS, ENVIRONMENT AND CULTURAL TRANSFER. You will find a call for papers on our homepage, which gives you more information about the program.

Please check the website again to be updated about the progress of our ambitious projects for 2009. We look forward to seeing you in Brno, The Netherlands and Shanghai

Best regards,

Rainald Franz
Silvia Barisione
Petra Krutisch
Ellenor Alcorn
Wolfgang Schepers
Elsebeth Welander-Berggren