Conservation for digitisation: A collaboration between the Palestinian Museum and the British library

Abstract

Since 2018, the Palestinian Museum in Ramallah has been digitising items from small institutions and private individuals in Palestine as part of their Digital Archive project. In 2019, a partnership was established with the British Library in London with a view to setting up the first paper conservation studio in the West Bank at the Museum. Library conservators provided training for a conservator and conservation manager from the Museum in paper conservation skills specific to the demands of digitisation projects. Initial training in London was followed up by ongoing distance mentoring as well as a visit by British Library conservators to Ramallah, in which conservation volunteers were also trained. This article details the aims of the collaboration, the challenges of putting together appropriate training programmes to be delivered in very limited time frames and the outcomes of the project thus far.