Conversation with Dr. Paul Michael Taylor, Curator, Researcher, and Program Director · Smithsonian Institution
- What are some of the most pressing cultural preservation challenges facing the Central Asia and South Caucasus regions today, from your viewpoint at the Smithsonian?
When we think of “cultural preservation,” we’re often talking about the preservation of historic artifacts, artworks, and past and contemporary built forms such as historic architecture and archeological sites. Each of these areas requiring preservation faces challenges worldwide, but specific concerns and approaches have developed in Central Asia and the Caucasus. For example, wherever we have mega-infrastructure projects such as the construction of subsurface pipelines, transportation corridors, or major building sites, we risk disturbing archeological sites that might not be recognized by the builders constructing these projects. Azerbaijan and Georgia have been particularly adept at surveying for and preserving archeological data in such cases; the construction of the BTC-SCP pipelines through those countries employed truly world-class methods for preserving the numerous archeological finds that were inadvertently located while building these cross-country pipelines. This was the subject of a book I wrote with Azerbaijani and other colleagues, “Past and Future Heritage in the Pipelines Corridor: Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkey”, published by the Smithsonian in 2011 (available in both Azerbaijani-English and Georgian-English bilingual editions). This is a good example of how people can balance the need for development and progress (even with mega-infrastructure construction) alongside the many advantages of careful preservation of history and of each nation’s cultural heritage.
We face other kinds of challenges in the future, including potential effects of climate change. I was honored to be invited to participate in the Plenary Session on “Safeguarding our Past and Future: Cultural Heritage in the Face of Climate Change” at last year’s World Forum on Intercultural Dialogue, held in Baku. My paper for that conference tried to make the point that “disaster preparedness” – including preparation for flooding, fires, and other natural disasters that may be associated with climate change – are curatorial responsibilities we should all be thinking about now. Preparing for such possible future disasters leads to better heritage management even if — as we all hope – those disasters do not ever actually happen. These efforts parallel efforts aimed at making sure our health care systems are capable of handling pandemics; this kind of preparation improves the quality of our health care systems even for everyday normal times when – as we also hope – no pandemic occurs.
Another very important area of cultural preservation is that of so-called “intangible” cultural heritage, such as music and performance, or traditional craftsmanship and artisanal manufactures, which require very different kinds of efforts for documentation and for preservation.
- How can organizations like CDDF better support cultural education and awareness in the U.S., especially when resources and visibility for these regions are limited?
CDDF has an enthusiastic group of supporters and a great mission; it is a small but active non-profit organization of the kind that can do great things without the heavy layers of bureaucracy that exist in large Washington-based organizations of the government or of local embassies. I think this gives CDDF an outstanding opportunity to organize events and carry out activities on its own, as well as by partnering with other organizations.
- Are there opportunities for grassroots organizations to collaborate with the Smithsonian or similar institutions in future exhibitions, research, or public programming?
The Smithsonian is a big place with over twenty museums and research centers, each having its own policies and procedures for “exhibitions, research, or public programming” – so each museum may handle such matters in its own way. Certainly, our office within the National Museum of Natural History’s Anthropology Department, the Smithsonian’s Asian Cultural History Program, has very successfully partnered with dynamic, small nonprofit organizations to host wonderful events including performances, lectures, and other activities. Each museum has its own policies for all such activities, which need to be coordinated with numerous offices.
- What best practices have you observed in building long-term, respectful partnerships with cultural communities—either within the region or among international partners?
I think partnerships come naturally if we have shared goals and can help each other reach those goals. This is usually the case with overseas museums, where curators and other museum professionals often share the same challenges and opportunities in working with collections and trying to reach a broad public. We have built good, on-going partnerships with many museums internationally through collaboration on specific projects such as international seminars or events.
- Are there any current or upcoming projects at the Smithsonian’s Central Asia Program that align with cultural diplomacy efforts we could learn from or support?
We very recently launched our new website about Artists of Modern Kazakhstan, working with that country’s Ministry of Culture and with the Canadian non-profit Civiconnect:
https://artists-of-kazakhstan.digitalcollections-civiconnect.com
That Canadian non-profit organization has helped develop and host several other recent examples of our research as part of its outstanding peer-reviewed series of websites, “Civiconnect Digital Collections”. The website about Kazakhstan’s artists was drawn from our previous research publication (also entitled Artists of Modern Kazakhstan), that I co-edited with my colleague Andreey Khazbulatov. Previously, we had also launched other websites drawn from previous research projects or publications. For example, our collaborative work with the Kasteyev Museum in Almaty, Kazakhstan, allowed us to produce the online publication “Kazakhstan Explored: Revisiting the Expeditions of Chokan Valikhanov in the Mid-Nineteenth Century”:
https://valikhanov.digitalcollections-civiconnect.com
Collaborations with Azerbaijan’s Academy of Sciences and Georgia’s National Museum were essential for the production of our 2022 website about the pipeline-related archeological work carried out in Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Turkey — “AGT: Pipelines to Cultural Heritage”:
https://agtpipeline.digitalcollections-civiconnect.com
Another example is our online publication entitled “The House of Dadiani and the Dadiani Palace Museum, Republic of Georgia.”:
https://dadiani.digitalcollections-civiconnect.com/ In all these cases, I consider our online publications rather different from the print editions, because they potentially allow for future development in new directions, for example by the addition of videos about or interviews of the artists depicted in our “Artists of Modern Kazakhstan”, and other multimedia additions to websites about Central Asia and the Caucasus. These represent opportunities for collaborative cultural diplomacy work – but this is all only one type of example, there are many others! Basically, in every area of our research, exhibition work, outreach, and collection development, there are many potential opportunities for effective collaborations with scholars, supporters, and friends whose help and involvement are most welcome.
