Workshop Week Addis Abeba

Coordinated by AfricaMuseum · Led by: the Ethiopian Art Conservation Program, the University of Antwerp, Bahir Dar University and the Institute of Ethiopian Studies

Day 1 opens the Workshop Week with a focus on documentation and innovation in heritage collections work. The day covers digital collections management, inclusive and culturally sensitive registration practices, and the use of emerging tools such as VR and 3D scanning to record objects and sites. The Workshop Week is coordinated by the AfricaMuseum and led by the Ethiopian Art Conservation Program, the University of Antwerp, Bahir Dar University and the Institute of Ethiopian Studies.

The session is built to be practical rather than theoretical. Participants see live demonstrations of documentation workflows, try scanning and registration tools themselves, and discuss how these methods can be adapted to their own institutions, whatever their current level of digital infrastructure.

Sessions on Day 1 are deliberately kept low-threshold and practical. Participants come from a wide range of backgrounds, including museum staff, conservators, students, academics and heritage officials, with varying levels of technical experience, so every session should be followable by non-specialists as well as experts, favour hands-on demonstration over theoretical presentation, and leave participants with a concrete tool, method or takeaway they can apply back home with minimal additional equipment.

By the end of the day, participants leave with a concrete documentation checklist and a first-hand sense of what digitisation realistically takes to set up and sustain.

Day 2 turns to conservation techniques and the physical installation of heritage objects and exhibitions, through the DACER-BDU partnership that is establishing Ethiopia's first Master in Art Conservation. The Workshop Week is coordinated by the AfricaMuseum and led by the Ethiopian Art Conservation Program, the University of Antwerp, Bahir Dar University and the Institute of Ethiopian Studies.

Participants work through practical conservation exercises alongside doctoral researchers and faculty, covering both the science of object conservation and the craft of preparing and mounting material for display. The day deliberately pairs conservation science with hands-on installation practice, so the two are learned together rather than as separate specialisms.

As on Day 1, sessions are kept low-threshold and practical for a mixed audience of museum staff, conservators, students, academics and heritage officials. Every session should be followable by non-specialists as well as experts, favour hands-on demonstration over theory, and leave participants with a concrete tool, method or takeaway they can apply at home.

The day is designed to be followed by participants with a wide range of backgrounds, from conservation specialists to museum staff handling installation for the first time, with practical techniques everyone can take back to their own collections.

Day 3 closes the training programme by turning from technique to policy. Discussions focus on the frameworks that make heritage management sustainable at an institutional level, and on the new Master in Art Conservation at Bahir Dar University as a concrete example of what long-term capacity-building looks like in practice. The Workshop Week is coordinated by the AfricaMuseum and led by the Ethiopian Art Conservation Program, the University of Antwerp, Bahir Dar University and the Institute of Ethiopian Studies.

Rather than abstract policy theory, the day works from real examples: how the DACER-BDU partnership was structured, what it took to secure institutional buy-in, and what other institutions represented in the room might learn from it or contribute to it.

Sessions remain low-threshold and practical, favouring concrete examples and discussion over abstract policy theory, and are designed to leave participants with a concrete insight, framework or contact they can follow up on back home.

Participants leave Day 3 with a clearer sense of the frameworks and relationships that keep heritage work going after a workshop ends, and with direct contacts at Bahir Dar University and the University of Antwerp for anyone considering a similar training partnership.