POLISH CONTRIBUTION TO THE SAVING OF CAMBODIAN HERITAGE
(1980-1993)

In 1979 the government in Phnom Penh approached the world
community with an appeal to help protect and preserve the
monuments of Angkor. The Ateliers for Conservation of Cultural
Property (PKZ) in Warsaw, Poland, answered the call, announcing
their readiness to send a team of experts to Cambodia. Profiting
from the diplomatic relations between Poland and Cambodia, a
four-member team under Prof. Wieslaw Domaslowski, director of the
Institute of Preservation and Conservation of Works of Art of the
Nicholaus Copernicus University in Tor£n, conducted a ten-day
survey of the Angkor monuments, the wall paintings around the
Silver Pagoda and the collections in the national Museum in Phnom
Penh. The 1991 Conservation Report compiled by the team, which
contained both practical suggestions and expert commentary, was
presented to UNESCO and to the Cambodian authorities.

By Lech Krzyzanowski

In 1985 the Polish-Cambodian Mission for the Restoration of the
Wall Paintings on the Silver Pagoda in Phnom Penh began
operations. The Silver Pagoda, which is surrounded by a wall 600
m long, constitutes a separate unit in the complex of buildings
belonging to the royal palace. The inside of the perimeter wall
was decorated in 1903-1904 with a series of murals representing
the Khmer interpretation of the Ramayana epic. The paintings
occupy a total of c. 2200 m2. Tropical climatic conditions and
the general deterioration of the wall itself had resulted in the
disintegration of the lower parts of the paintings and the
generally poor condition of what still remained of them.

RESTORATION PROCEDURES
For eight years now a Khmer team consisting of several dozen
workers has been working for 3-4 months annually on the
restoration (the workers include manual labourers, masons, and
artists from the University of Fine Arts in Phnom Penh). The wall
has been insulated, the original plaster desalinated, and new
plaster introduced to replace what has been lost. Part of the
peeling plaster has been re-attached and some of the original
painting layer has been preserved. Depending on the annual work
schedule, the Polish side assures the participation of 1-4
certified specialists who prepare a technical programme,
supervise the work, and participate in it, providing conservation
materials and equipment brought from Poland. The specialists are
also involved in instructing and educating the Khmer team in the
principles and methods of painting conservation. In the future,
joint conservation projects and the training provided for
participants on the Khmer side should lead to a solution which
can be considered satisfactory from the point of view of
conservation. In time, a Khmer team which is fully capable of
undertaking preservation activities independently will have been
trained and prepared.
The three-month season in 1993 ended on December 21, just as
ambassadors in Phnom Penh were negotiating an international
programme for the saving of the Cambodian national heritage,
which is an implementation of the Angkor Resolution adopted by
the International conference in Tokyo in October 1993. The work
of the Polish-Cambodian mission engaged at Phnom Penh has been
summed up in a recent comprehensive report (see references).

BAYON TEMPLE
In the 1990 the Polish-Cambodian Archaeological and Preservation
Mission at the Bayon Temple in Angkor embarked on a pilot project
which was intended to protect and preserve the monument as well
as to investigate it from the archaeological point of view. The
problem was presented to the international community of experts
in the mission's English-language report on the Bayon Temple (see
references). Negotiation with the L'Ecole Francaise d'Extreme
Orient in Paris and the Institute of Asian Culture of Sophia
University in Tokyo, not to mention the UNESCO in Paris, failed
to attract sponsors, ultimately causing the mission to be
suspended. Up to and including 1992, all the costs of operating
the mission in Cambodia were covered by the ateliers of the PKZ
from its own resources. The hosts have also participated
significantly in covering the costs of the mission's operation in
the field. The autumm 1993 season was sponsored by the Ministry
of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Poland.

FRIENDS OF ANGKOR WAT
In April 1988, the International Association "Friends of Angkor
Wat" was granted legal status in Warsaw. In 1986-1987 two TV
documentary films (Austrian and Polish) on problems of the
Cambodian heritage were made on the initiative of the
Organizational Committee of the Association. Both films were
distributed in over 40 countries throughout the world.

EDUCON
The PKZ has also prepared a programme called EDUCON, which is
based on eight years' practical conservation experience in
Cambodia. The programme specifies the Polish approach to the
protection and preservation of the Cambodian historical and
cultural heritage and calls for specific actions to be
undertaken. It has been presented to the UNESCO in Paris, the
Conference of Experts of Angkor in Siem Reap (April 1993), and
the International Conference on Angkor held in Tokyo in October
1993.

EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMME
At PKZ it is believed the key to the practical protection of
Cambodian heritage does not lie in the implementation of foreign
programmes which anticipate the seasonal arrival teams of
specialists from abroad, although such programme should by all
means participate. An educational scheme which would prepare
local Khmer workers to carry out simple preservation jobs which
could be realized during the course of specific joint projects on
the monuments in Cambodia would have the following positive
effects:
a. Improve the condition of a number of Cambodia's monuments;
b. Substantially develop the human potential in Cambodia as far
as the protection of monuments is concerned, combining this
development with the opening of new job opportunities;
c. Provide professional conservation teams with a base in
Cambodia.
The Cambodian side is in favour of this line of action, which was
indicated by the approval of the programme expressed by the head
of the Cambodian delegation at the Intergovernmental Conference
in Tokyo.
In 1986 the Polish Ministry of National Education sponsored five
scholarships for students to study conservation at the Institute
for the Preservation and Conservation of Works of Art of the
Nicholaus Copernicus University in Tor£n. The first to obtain a
diploma in conservation, in 1993, was a Cambodian student.
Another nine Cambodians have been sent by the Cambodian Monument
Protection Service to participate in training programmes
conducted in the laboratories and ateliers of the Ateliers for
the Conservation of Cultural Property (PKZ) in Poland.

(Translated from Polish by Iwona Zych)

REFERENCES

'The Bayon Temple. Vol 1: The Report of the Polish-Cambodian
Archaeological and Preservation Mission 1990', Warsaw 1991 (PKZ
Publications).

'La pagoda d'argent. Vol. 1: Rapport de la Mission
Polone-Cambodgienne de Conservation des Monuments a Phnom Penh
1985-1992', Varsovie 1993 (Editions de PKZ).

Polak T., 'International Cooperation to Rescue the Angkor
Complex', Cambodia English summary), Ochrona Zabytk¢w (Polish
Quarter Review) No. 4 (1990), P. 221.