Cultural property

Cultural property comprises the physical items that are part of the cultural heritage of a group or society,^[1] as opposed to less tangible cultural expressions.^[2] They include such items as cultural landscapes, historic buildings, works of art, archaeological sites, as well as collections of libraries, archives and museums.

Cultural property is legally protected by a number of international agreements and national laws. There is intensive cooperation between the United Nations, UNESCO and Blue Shield International on the protection of cultural goods.^[3]^[4]^[5]

Definition

The phrase was used in various contexts in the 19th century. In 1891, The Bulletin of the United States Fish Commission described various countries' relationships to their fishing-related cultural properties including Germany, England, France, Italy, and Holland.^[6] In 1899, it was also used in the context of oyster fishing in Holland.^[7]

There is no universally agreed-upon definition of cultural property.^[8] One widely used definition is provided by Article 1 of the Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict of 1954:^[9]

"The term 'cultural property' shall cover, irrespective of origin or ownership:

(a) movable or immovable property of great importance to the cultural heritage of every people, such as monuments of architecture, art or history, whether religious or secular; archaeological sites; groups of buildings which, as a whole, are of historical or artistic interest; works of art; manuscripts, books and other objects of artistic, historical or archaeological interest; as well as scientific collections and important collections of books or archives or of reproductions of the property defined above;

(b) buildings whose main and effective purpose is to preserve or exhibit the movable cultural property defined in sub-paragraph (a) such as museums, large libraries and depositories of archives, and refuges intended to shelter, in the event of armed conflict, the movable cultural property defined in sub-paragraph (a);

(c) centers containing a large amount of cultural property as defined in sub-paragraphs (a) and (b), to be known as 'centers containing monuments'."

Cultural heritage has been described as the 'most distinguishing form of a culture's expression' and includes both tangible and intangible elements such as 'traditional dances, customs and ceremonies'.^[10] Cultural property is the essential elements of a culture that allow it to determined and identified.^[10]

Emblem

Article 16 of the Convention describes the internationally recognized mark for cultural property as follows:

(1) The distinctive emblem of the Convention shall take the form of a shield, pointed below, persaltire blue and white (a shield consisting of a royal-blue square, one of the angles of which forms the point of the shield, and of a royal-blue triangle above the square, the space on either side being taken up by a white triangle).

Use of the Emblem is restricted under international humanitarian law. Guidance for using the emblem is available from The Blue Shield, and UNESCO.

History

The theme of the 1998 and 1999 International Museum Day was "The Fight against Illicit Traffic of Cultural Property."^[11]

References

^ Ann Marie Sullivan, Cultural Heritage & New Media: A Future for the Past, 15 J. MARSHALL REV. INTELL. PROP. L. 604 (2016) https://repository.jmls.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1392&context=ripl
^ Lixinski, Lucas, 'Definitions: From Cultural Property to Cultural Heritage (and Back?)', International Heritage Law for Communities: Exclusion and Re-Imagination, Cultural Heritage Law and Policy (Oxford, 2019; online edn, Oxford Academic, 18 July 2019), https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198843306.003.0002, accessed 27 Jan. 2023.
^ "UNESCO Legal Instruments: Second Protocol to the Hague Convention of 1954 for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict 1999".
^ Roger O'Keefe, Camille Péron, Tofig Musayev, Gianluca Ferrari "Protection of Cultural Property. Military Manual." UNESCO, 2016, S. 73ff.
^ UNESCO Director-General calls for stronger cooperation for heritage protection at the Blue Shield International General Assembly. UNESCO, 13 September 2017.
^ Commission, United States Fish (1893). Bulletin of the United States Fish Commission. U.S. Government Printing Office.
^ Parliament, Canada (1899). Sessional Papers of the Dominion of Canada.
^ Knox, Christine K (2006). "They've Lost Their Marbles: 2002 Universal Museums' Declaration, The Elgin Marbles and the Future of the Repatriation Movement". Suffolk Transnational Law Review. 29: 315–336.
^ Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict with Regulations for the Execution of the Convention 1954 at the UNESCO website
^ ^a ^b Shapiro, Daniel (1998). "Repatriation: A modest Proposal". heinonline.org. Archived from the original on 2021-08-04. Retrieved 2021-08-04.
^ Launch of International Museum Day 2011 ‘Objects tell your story’, Hunan Provincial Museum.

[1] Ann Marie Sullivan, Cultural Heritage & New Media: A Future for the Past, 15 J. MARSHALL REV. INTELL. PROP. L. 604 (2016) https://repository.jmls.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1392&context=ripl

[2] Lixinski, Lucas, 'Definitions: From Cultural Property to Cultural Heritage (and Back?)', International Heritage Law for Communities: Exclusion and Re-Imagination, Cultural Heritage Law and Policy (Oxford, 2019; online edn, Oxford Academic, 18 July 2019), https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198843306.003.0002, accessed 27 Jan. 2023.

[3] "UNESCO Legal Instruments: Second Protocol to the Hague Convention of 1954 for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict 1999".

[4] Roger O'Keefe, Camille Péron, Tofig Musayev, Gianluca Ferrari "Protection of Cultural Property. Military Manual." UNESCO, 2016, S. 73ff.

[5] UNESCO Director-General calls for stronger cooperation for heritage protection at the Blue Shield International General Assembly. UNESCO, 13 September 2017.

[6] Commission, United States Fish (1893). Bulletin of the United States Fish Commission. U.S. Government Printing Office.

[7] Parliament, Canada (1899). Sessional Papers of the Dominion of Canada.

[8] Knox, Christine K (2006). "They've Lost Their Marbles: 2002 Universal Museums' Declaration, The Elgin Marbles and the Future of the Repatriation Movement". Suffolk Transnational Law Review. 29: 315–336.

[9] Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict with Regulations for the Execution of the Convention 1954 at the UNESCO website

[:0-10] Shapiro, Daniel (1998). "Repatriation: A modest Proposal". heinonline.org. Archived from the original on 2021-08-04. Retrieved 2021-08-04.

[11] Launch of International Museum Day 2011 ‘Objects tell your story’, Hunan Provincial Museum.

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Category Commons WikiProject Changes

v t e Cultural heritage and historic preservation
Topics and issues	Agents of deterioration Archival processing Archaeological science Archaeology Archive Bioarchaeology Book Calendar (archives) Conservation and restoration of cultural property Conservation and restoration of immovable cultural property Conservation and restoration of movable cultural property Conservation science (cultural property) Collecting Collection (museum) Collection catalog Collections maintenance Collections management Collections management system Cultural heritage Cultural heritage management Cultural property Cultural property documentation Cultural property exhibition Cultural property imaging Cultural property storage Cultural resource management Database preservation Deaccessioning Digital library Digital photograph restoration Digital preservation Disaster preparedness (cultural property) Film preservation Finding aid Fonds Found in collection Heritage asset Heritage science Inherent vice Intangible cultural heritage Integrated pest management (cultural property) Inventory (library and archive) Inventory (museums) Media preservation Midden Mold control and prevention (library and archive) Museum Optical media preservation Preservation (library and archive) Preservation metadata Preservation survey Provenance Repatriation Ruins Sustainable preservation Treasure Web archiving
Roles and expertise	Archivist Art dealer Art handler Auctioneer Collection manager Conservator-restorer Conservation scientist Conservation technician Curator Exhibition designer Mount maker Objects conservator Paintings conservator Photograph conservator Preservationist Registrar (cultural property) Textile conservator
Methods and techniques	Aging (artwork) Anastylosis Arrested decay Cradling (paintings) Cultural property radiography Detachment of wall paintings Desmet method Display case Digital repository audit method based on risk assessment Historic paint analysis Inpainting Kintsugi Leafcasting Lining of paintings Mass deacidification Overpainting Paleo-inspiration Paper splitting Reconstruction (architecture) Rissverklebung Textile stabilization Transfer of panel paintings UVC-based preservation VisualAudio
Conservation and restoration of immovable cultural property by item type	Archaeological sites Frescos Heritage railways Historic gardens Outdoor artworks Outdoor bronze objects Outdoor murals
Conservation and restoration of movable cultural property by item type	Aircraft Ancient Greek pottery Bone, horn, and antler objects Books, manuscripts, documents and ephemera Ceramic objects Clocks Copper-based objects Feathers Film Flags and banners Fur objects Glass objects Herbaria Human remains Illuminated manuscripts Insect specimens Iron and steel objects Ivory objects Judaica Lacquerware Leather objects Lighthouses Metals Musical instruments Neon objects New media art Paintings Painting frames Panel paintings Papyrus Parchment Performance art Photographs Photographic plates Plastic objects Rail vehicles Road vehicles Shipwreck artifacts Silver objects South Asian household shrines Stained glass Taxidermy Textiles Tibetan thangkas Time-based media art Totem poles Vinyl discs Woodblock prints Wooden artifacts Wooden furniture
Intangible cultural heritage preservation	Ancient music Applied folklore Dance notation Early music Endangered language Ethnochoreology Ethnomusicology Ethnopoetics Family folklore Folklore Folk art Folk dance Folk etymology Folk instrument Folk music Folk process Folk play Foodways Folklore studies Heritage language Heritage language learning Indigenous intellectual property Indigenous culture Indigenous language Language death Language preservation Language revitalization Living history Oral history preservation Preservation of meaning Prehistoric music Tradition preservation Traditional knowledge Traditional medicine
Notable projects	Conservation issues of Pompeii and Herculaneum Conservation-restoration of Ecce Homo by Elías García Martínez Conservation-restoration of The Gross Clinic by Thomas Eakins Conservation-restoration of Leonardo da Vinci's The Last Supper Pompeian frescoes Conservation-restoration of the Shroud of Turin Conservation-restoration of the Sistine Chapel frescoes Conservation-restoration of the Statue of Liberty Conservation-restoration of the H.L. Hunley Conservation response to flood of Arno, Florence Modern and Contemporary Art Research Initiative Preservation Metadata: Implementation Strategies World Heritage Site

Definition

Emblem

History

See also

References