Preservation Week, April 30 – May 6, inspires action to preserve personal, family, and community collections in addition to library, museum, and archive collections. It also raises awareness of the role libraries and other cultural institutions play in providing ongoing preservation education and information.
The 2023 Preservation Week theme is Building Resilient Communities. Every year, communities and their history are under threat from natural and human-made disasters. Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha is the 2023 Honorary Chair of Preservation Week. She is the C. S. Mott Endowed Professor of Public Health at Michigan State University College of Human Medicine and founding director of the Pediatric Public Health Initiative, an innovative partnership of MSU and Hurley Children’s Hospital in Flint, Michigan. As a leading activist and public health expert who continues to serve the people of Flint, Dr. Hanna-Attisha has first-hand experience creating services and securing vital resources to foster a more resilient community.
During Preservation Week, libraries, museums, institutions and communities are urged to examine the effects on collections and their keepers, as well as resiliency strategies.
A variety of online presentations are available for free! Follow Preservation Week on Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube for more resources and information.
Free webinars
ALA Core webinars
There When You Need Us: Crisis Collecting Support, Tuesday, May 2 @ 1 p.m. CDT
Presented by Kara McClurken and Vanessa St.Oegger-Menn
Cultural heritage institutions must respond quickly during crises while contending with conditions impacting their lives and work. The Society of American Archivist’s Crisis, Disaster, and Tragedy Response Working Group provides support and connection for empathetic, ethical, and sustainable collecting practices. This webinar will introduce attendees to resources available through the working group as well as what they can do to prepare for collecting during and after both natural disasters or human-made tragedies.
Networking Strategies Improve Disaster Readiness, Thursday, May 4 @ 1 p.m. CDT
Presented by Steve Pine
Alliances between public and institutional entities provide improved strength and resilience to disasters by recognizing common core values, creating alliances and sharing resources. Examples of successful relationships and the challenges they managed can provide collection leadership with models for improved readiness.
Library of Congress webinars (held the week of April 24th)
Mapping our Collections with Scientific Imaging, Monday, April 24, 11 a.m. EDT
Presented by Eric Monroe, PhD., Head Scientific Laboratory Section, Preservation Research and Testing Division
Many people are unfamiliar with “imaging” in collections care and the various methods by which it can be applied. In our imaging of collections, we add more than a visual image of the library or heritage object, we go beneath the layers, and capture a range of information with various scientific instrumentation. Hear about some of our imaging techniques such as multispectral imaging, IRENE, and more.
Assessing Collections for Space and Condition, Tuesday, April 25, 11 a.m. EDT
Presented by Beatriz Haspo, Collections Officer, Collection Management Division
The Library of Congress struggles with storage space like any other institution. This webinar will discuss the Preservation Directorate’s efforts to create an integrated approach to space management and collection needs assessment for its vast collection.
Web Archiving at the Library of Congress: Preserving Internet History for Memory and Research, Wednesday, April 26, 11 a.m. EDT
Presented by Senior Digital Collection Specialists Lauren Baker, Grace Bicho, and Chase Dooley
The Library of Congress Web Archive manages, preserves, and provides access to archived web content selected by subject experts from across the Library. Three experts from the Library’s Web Archiving Program team will present an overview of web archiving, highlighting what web archiving is, who does it and why it is important, and how we approach preservation of web content at the Library of Congress using the United States Election Web Archive as an example.
An Introduction to the Conservation Internship at the Library of Congress, Thursday, April 27, 11 a.m. EDT
Presented by Advanced Conservation Interns Meredith French, Veronica Mercado, Emily Mercer
The photograph, paper, and book sections in the Library of Congress Conservation Laboratory hosts advanced conservation interns from the Buffalo State University and the Winterthur/University of Delaware Program in Art Conservation. Book intern, Verónica Mercado, will present on the path students take to pursue art conservation, while photograph intern Emily Mercer and paper intern Meredith French will showcase treatments they are conducting at the lab.
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Library
Film Inspection and Handling 101, Tuesday, May 2, 11 a.m. CDT
Do you have film collections? Are you interested in their long-term preservation but don’t know how to get started? Join UIUC’s Media Preservation program during Preservation Week 2023 for pro tips on film preservation fundamentals. Whether you have large or small collections, large or small budgets, this webinar will introduce participants to the basics of film inspection and handling. Participants will learn a film’s physical condition through the inspection process, discover a variety of film equipment, and basic conservation treatment.
Conservation of Balinese Shadow Puppets from the Mabou Mines Archives, Tuesday, May 2, 1 p.m. EDT
Peiyuan Sun, a fourth-year graduate student at the Conservation Center, Institute of Fine Arts, NYU, will discuss the history, manufacture, and conservation treatment of a group of Balinese shadow puppets from the Mabou Mines Archive (MSS.133), part of the Fales Library holdings in the Special Collections at NYU Libraries, and the ways in which she is actively working to make these items more accessible to future users.