National Seminar on Conservation

In line with JDCA's aim to be a catalyst for cross-disciplinary connections, its first ever major conference, the National Seminar on Conservation, was held during the final days of the artists' camps in January 2004, allowing the "makers" of art to come together in the evenings with those involved in conserving heritage.

Eminent professionals from across the country attended the seminar. Participants included:

• Professionals such as town planners, architects and environmentalists

• Government representation from the Ministry of Culture and Ministry of Environment

• Representatives of the creative community such as painters, sculptors, craft and tribal experts

• Academicians and scholars ; NGO's and INTACH

• Delegates from UNESCO who presented a paper and expressed their support for ongoing and future projects of JDCA

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The agenda addressed natural and manmade heritage, intangible and tangible, recognizing that change is a part of life and conservation can take a variety of forms including recycling and re-use. Cultural policy and administration were examined. A number of studies pertinent to Orissa took discussions to case-specific issues, such as heritage management, tribal folklore and language. The papers, which included discourses on flora and fauna, water bodies, rock carvings, landscape, town planning, linguistics and literature, documentation issues, tribal culture and habitat, are being prepared for publication. JDCA hopes to produce an abridged version for schools.

Participants included: Anupam Sah INTACH, architect A.R. Ramanathan, architect and town planner B.V. Doshi, Belinda Wright, Chandra Shekar Rath, linguist Debi Prasanna Pattanayak, town planner E.F.N. Rebierro, Hara Narayan Dash, Jagadananda, Director Programmes, INTACH, Janhwij Sharma, craft expert Jaya Jaitly, Jt. Secretary, Dept. of Culture, Jayakumar, Professor of Architecture, K.T. Ravindran, textile expert Amba Sanyal, Director UNESCO, Mohsen Towfix, Dept. of Handloom, Govt. of India, Mona Sharma, conservation specialist and Professor, School of Planning and Architecture, Nalini Thakur, Chairman, Osian's, Neville Tuli, INTACH's Nilabh Sinha, Director General INTACH, O. P. Agarwal, architect P.K. Das, artist Prafulla Mohanty, photographer Raghu Rai, conservation architect Gurmeet Rai, Director, Institute of Physics, R.K. Choudhury, Professor, Dept. of Architecture CEPT, Santosh Mishra, geologist and former Vice-Chancellor of Utkal University, Orissa, Satyananda Acharya, poet Sitakanta Mohapatra, Subhendu Mund, Sukanta Basu, Senior Advisor, Development Alternatives, S. K. Mishra, Development Commissioner Handloom, Ministry of Textile, Subhash Pani and environmentalist Vandana Shiva.