Experiences of the World Monuments Fund in Balancing

Interpretation with Preservation

8th US/ICOMOS International Symposium

Introduction
WMF Overview

The World Monuments Fund (WMF) is a private, not-for-profit, international organization devoted
to on-site conservation of monuments and sites world wide. Established in 1965, WMF brings
together public and private support to implement comprehensive preservation efforts, all of which
are conducted in collaboration with local individuals and organizations.

At the present time WMF is working with over 250 archaeological and architectural conservation
field projects in over 80 countries by means of advocacy, technical and financial assistance. In
the course of this work, WMF has become increasingly aware of the importance of effective site
presentation, and its role in assisting with the conservation goals of endangered sites and their
long-term sustainability.

This paper will outline two representative case studies of active conservation field projects as part
of regional initiatives in Egypt and India: Luxor, on banks of the Nile south of Cairo, and Jaisalmer
Fort in western Rajasthan. These projects reflect WMF’s general working strategy for advancing
conservation field projects in countries where our presence is substantial. Inherent in these
projects is the goal of incorporating interpretive components that balance the needs of site access
and project visibility, visitor awareness of the threats posed, and, ultimately, site preservation and
presentation to the public.

Regional Initiatives and Partnerships

Over the past three decades, WMF has developed a regional approach based on partnerships to
help guide its global agenda to conserve, present and manage its field projects at cultural
heritage sites. These partnership arrangements can provide WMF and other stakeholders with
an opportunity to pool financial and technical resources, but also to share the risks and
responsibilities for project management.

While achieving common goals for a successful joint project may be the immediate focus of a
new partnership, once a visible field project is mobilized, added value can quickly result from
attracting greater levels of public interest and support than that initially invested by the core
stakeholders. Efforts to engage the public in the process of conservation work at heritage sites
has been able to satisfy a visitor’s growing curiosity of the process of restoration in general while
raising their level of awareness of the impact of tourism on heritage sites.

The accountability and transparency needed for a successful international project can be assured
by a clearly structured, overarching partnership agreement, as well as a detailed project
agreement. It is within the framework of partnership and project agreements that WMF specifies
its interest to incorporate presentation and interpretive project components to compliment its
institutional mission and goals of site conservation, advocacy and education.

WMF has found economies of scale in its attempt to maximize its resources and generate as
much exposure and support for regional conservation initiatives. Through strategic planning and
a careful project identification phase, it is possible to assemble a group of projects that address
common thematic problem and building types. This has proven to be the case in Luxor and
Experiences of the World Monuments Fund in Balancing Interpretation with Preservation
Paper submitted by Mark A. Weber, World Monuments Fund
95 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 – mweber@wmf.org – Tel: 646-424-9594 – Fax: 646-424-9593

Jaisalmer where the fundamental threats and challenges posed at these sites are overabundance
of water and the adverse effects of growing tourism.

Case Studies
The WMF City of Ancient Thebes Conservation Initiative

Historical Background
The Ancient City of Thebes was the center of the Egyptian Empire
beginning in c. 2134 B.C. and continued in this capacity for at least
an additional 1200 years. Thebes developed during the golden era
of ancient Egypt as a result of serving a dual purpose – as the royal
residence and the seat of worship for the supreme deity Amon. The
temples to Amon were constructed on the Nile’s east bank while the
colossal mortuary temples were assembled on the west bank. The
royal tombs were tucked away into the protected valleys west of the
Nile. These three areas comprised Ancient Thebes and are known
today as the modern cities of Luxor and Karnak, the west bank of the
Nile Valley and the Valley of the Kings. WMF has become involved with multiple partners in
conservation and presentation projects in all three zones.

Problems and Challenges

The conservation challenges found in modern day Luxor, set along the Nile floodplain and the
outlying steeply-shaped wadi environments, are daunting. WMF is currently working with an
array of international partners in the Luxor area to raise awareness and address the multiple
threats to the monuments of Ancient Thebes. The most damaging are the geo-phenomenon of
rising ground water and the resulting migration of corrosive salts into the sandstone/limestone
foundations, architectural elements and decorated fragments. The amount of deterioration that
results from the crystallization of the salts as the water evaporates from the stone is enormous
and can compromise the structural integrity of a monument as well as cause the irreversible loss
of ornaments from stone fragments – ornaments critical in identifying the origin and carving date
of the fragment.

Numerous studies have targeted the culprit: construction of the Aswan Dam in the 1960’s and the
subsequent elimination of seasonal flooding along the Nile which provided a natural remedy for
cleansing the salts from the architecture. Newly adopted irrigation practices for the production of
sugar cane in Luxor have exacerbated the problem, with the subsequent rise in soil salinity.

WMF was among the first global preservation organizations to

acknowledge this threat and to begin funding several projects
focused on documentation, conservation and site presentation.
In 1998, WMF first listed a site in the Ancient City of Thebes
®
on its World Monuments Watch list of 100 Most Endangered
Sites that included the Colossi of Memnon and the Mortuary
Temple of King Amenhotep III, once the largest and most
richly equipped of all Theban temples. Through a grant from
American Express, WMF helped the German Institute of
Archaeology to begin the emergency salvage and documentation and the planning of a long-
range conservation program for the site, threatened by rising levels of ground water and
encroaching agricultural activity.
Experiences of the World Monuments Fund in Balancing Interpretation with Preservation
Paper submitted by Mark A. Weber, World Monuments Fund
95 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 – mweber@wmf.org – Tel: 646-424-9594 – Fax: 646-424-9593

Field projects at Luxor and Karnak temples soon followed. WMF

collaborated with the University of Chicago’s Oriental Institute and
its Epigraphic Survey team to develop a conservation approach at
Luxor Temple, where thousands of misplaced sandstone
fragments are lifted off the temple’s damp grounds and moved to
mastabas – specially designed platforms - where they have been
sorted, inventoried and grouped according to iconography. The
Epigraphic Survey is also working to conserve the fragments with
the ultimate goal of reassembling half of them back into their
original wall positions in Luxor Temple and, as recently discovered, the other half back to their
original positions at Karnak Temple over 3 kilometers away. The remaining stone material will be
presented in an open-air museum adjacent to Luxor Temple.

Efforts to address these threats are supported by Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA)
and the Ministry of Culture and Agriculture, as well as many foreign governments, including the
United States. Over the past eight years, a battery of interventions have been carefully studied
and implemented on various scales, from the introduction of damp-proof layers to protect
fragments awaiting conservation, to the bold holistic approach now taken up by the Supreme
Council of Antiquities of installing water management systems around the Luxor and Karnak
temples.

Valley of the King’s Master Plan and Signage Project: A Tool for Site Management,
Conservation, and Presentation.

All of the major historical sites in the Luxor region are facing
a host of problems: flash floods, rising water tables,
encroaching agricultural practices and development,
geological instability, environmental changes and vandalism.
But perhaps the greatest threat to one of the most visited
archaeological sites in the world, the Valley of the Kings on
the West Bank of the Nile, is posed by rapidly increasing
numbers of visitors, who inflict considerable damage to the
painted wall surfaces.

In the mid-1960’s, at the time the Aswan Dam was being built, only a few dozen visitors trekked
up to see the elaborately decorated tombs of nearly all of Egypt’s New Kingdom Pharaohs,
including Tutankhamen, Seti I and Ramses II. By 2004, the Theban Necropolis was
overburdened by an average of 7,000 tourists a day visiting approximately 14 tombs currently
open to visitors, 11 at a time and now on a rotating schedule. The other 48 tombs in the valley are
either closed due to poor conditions or for restoration efforts. The Egyptian Ministry of Tourism is
bracing itself for an estimated 12,000 visitors daily by 2017.

The pressures from mass tourism have already reached a

critical level and taken its toll on the artifacts the crowds are
flocking to see. In the past, the numbers of visitors and the
manner in which the tomb tours were given was largely
unchecked, if not downright chaotic. Lecturing took place
inside the tombs, resulting in a noisy, crowded event that often
led to fabric damage and the occasional fist fight; hardly a
pleasant visitor experience in what should be a respectful,
serene and contemplative environment.
Experiences of the World Monuments Fund in Balancing Interpretation with Preservation
Paper submitted by Mark A. Weber, World Monuments Fund
95 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 – mweber@wmf.org – Tel: 646-424-9594 – Fax: 646-424-9593

In an effort to confront this growing trend head-on, the SCA commissioned the American
University in Cairo’s Theban Mapping Project (TMP) to begin working on a comprehensive
master plan for the Valley of the Kings to address the challenges and issues of tourist
management and site protection.

In 2000, again through Watch listing, the man-made and natural threats confronting the Valley of
the Kings were announced to the world. In 2001, WMF and the Watch program’s founding
sponsor, American Express, embarked upon a comprehensive five-year master planning,
conservation and site interpretation project at the Valley of the Kings. A series of independent
project components within the Egyptian M/C and TMP’s planning effort have been the target of
recent WMF support.

WMF Valley of Kings Signage Project Component

The initial phase of the WMF-funded project was for the

“interpretive infrastructure” needs of the site - the design,
production, and installation of new signage. The purpose of this
program was two-fold: to present accurate and graphically clear
information on the tombs and general site orientation, and to
make it possible for the guides to give their lectures outside
instead of inside the tombs, using the signs as visual aids. Once
the new signs were in place, the SCA was to impose a policy of
prohibiting tour guides from lecturing inside the tombs.

Damage to the tomb interiors had been increasing at an alarming rate and
caused by, among other things, improper visitor behavior (touching the
walls), rapid temperature fluctuations and rising humidity levels. In fact, the
need to control the numbers of visitors to individual tombs became all too
apparent, when recently a tomb opened to visitors for only several months
resulted in humidity levels so high that condensation formed on the
handrails and on the wall paintings. This event caused the site managers to
judiciously rotate the opening of the tombs.

In the fall of 2000, a total of 32 signs were installed, 19 for individual tombs
that are now open or soon to be open to the public; 9 maps of the Vof K’s
showing both East and West Valleys, a schematic plan showing overall site
layout and tomb location, surface features and topography; two signs explaining the history of the
discovery of Tutankhamen’s tomb; and two listing open tombs difficult to access and which are
wheelchair accessible.

The map signs were installed at the Valley’s entrance, at

shaded rest areas and at critical pathway junctions, and were
intended to allow guides to more effectively explain the
chronological development of the Valley and tomb
construction.

The tomb signs were carefully located adjacent to the

appropriate tomb entrance in positions that would not interfere
with traffic flow. There, each sign informs the visitor of its number, name of owner, its date of
construction and discovery, and brief notes on its architectural and decorative features.

The text is kept to a minimum and, at the request of the SCA, appears only in English to avoid
clutter. The tomb’s number and owner’s name are written in Arabic on the signs top cross-bar.
And an Arabic language site brochure, distributed free of charge, was published and intended for
Experiences of the World Monuments Fund in Balancing Interpretation with Preservation
Paper submitted by Mark A. Weber, World Monuments Fund
95 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 – mweber@wmf.org – Tel: 646-424-9594 – Fax: 646-424-9593

Egyptian schoolchildren who visit the Valley of the Kings as part of their secondary school
curriculum.

Each sign was laser printed in black and white on 3mm thick
aluminum sheets that are scratch, weather and chemical proof,
and guaranteed to withstand the harsh Valley desert
environment, where temperatures can rise up to 40 degrees
Celsius during the summer season.

The signs were designed by the TMP, using their own

axonometric drawings and photographs produced during
surveys, printed in Switzerland, and then shipped to Egypt,
where they were attached to steel mounts manufactured in Cairo.

Results and On-going Work

This project has been a success with the tourists and guides alike. The TMP has conducted a
visitor survey that has yielded positive comments about the signage program and helpful
feedback for the master planning issues now being addressed, such as services offered,
transportation within the site, and the need for a new visitor center.

The new signs greatly improve the quality of the tourists’ visits and provide for a safer and more
stable environment for the tombs. The net result and benefit to the site has been improved tourist
circulation, fewer delays, less damage to the tombs painted surfaces, and less crowded and
quieter interiors, thereby allowing tourists to experience and appreciate the tomb’s wonders in a
respectful setting.

The SCA has chosen the new signs to serve as models for future installations in the Valley of the
Queens, the mortuary temples and the private tombs at Thebes.

Two interrelated goals of the current Valley of the Kings

program is the implementation of an environmental monitoring
program while simultaneously improving the visitor experience.
This year, demonstration projects for two tombs, KV9 (Ramses
V and VI) and KV14 (Tawosret and Sekhnakhte), are being
conducted that include the installation of temperature and
humidity controls, air conditioning, new lighting, and a more
discrete placement of the cables and air ductwork. The
current ideas being tested are installing as much of this
infrastructure under the wooden platforms used for visitor
circulation.

Comprehensive conditions reports and conservation plans are simultaneously being prepared by
KV9 and KV14. More general fabric surveys will be prepared for 13 more tombs currently or
likely to be opened to the public.

Queen’s Palace Heritage Interpretation Center, Jaisalmer, India: Preserving and

presenting the cultural traditions of the only “living” fort city in India.

The preservation of Jaisalmer Fort in Rajastan, India, and select

buildings within the citadel has been the cornerstone project of
the World Monuments Fund’s 10 year conservation initiative in
India. Currently, WMF is servicing 10 actively funded field
Experiences of the World Monuments Fund in Balancing Interpretation with Preservation
Paper submitted by Mark A. Weber, World Monuments Fund
95 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 – mweber@wmf.org – Tel: 646-424-9594 – Fax: 646-424-9593

projects and is monitoring and advocating for another dozen past and present Watch List sites.

Historical Background
Strategically sited on a Rajasthan hilltop, the fortified city
of Jaisalmer is one of India’s greatest architectural
treasures and its only “living” occupied fort. Founded in
1156 A.D. by the Rajput prince, Rawal Jaisal, Jaisalmer is
known colloquially as Sonar Kila, or the Golden Fort, after
the luminous sandstone of which it is built. Jaisalmer’s
merchants and townspeople prospered from the city’s
propitious location on a caravan route through the Thar
Desert, which linked Delhi and Gujurat with Central Asia
and the Middle East. With riches derived from trade in spices, silks, stallions, and slaves, the
people of Jaisalmer built magnificent havelis (houses) exquisitely carved from golden-yellow
sandstone.

British rule and the growth of the maritime trade between India and the West forced the decline of
the overland trade business. Then, with the closing of the boarder with Pakistan in 1947,
Jaisalmer became a forgotten outpost, at that time off the beaten tourist path of Rajasthan’s more
famous fort cities of Jiapur and Jodhpur.

The fort city, with its 2,500 residents packed within its
walls, is situated on a plateau elevated about 150 feet
above the desert floor. The fort is circumscribed by an
impressive layering of defensive features; 89 bastions
and the two parallel upper walls provide the innermost
line of defense with the mori, or sentry’s walkway, tucked
in behind the crenellated outer wall. The slope and the
lower pitching wall complete the defensive system.
Below the fort lies the modern city of Jaisalmer, with a
population of 40,000 and, beyond, the desolate plains of
the Thar Desert.

Problems and Challenges

Though the fort has endured for more than eight centuries, it has been brought to the brink of
destruction in the span of only a few decades due to heavy tourist traffic and water damage
resulting from direct infiltration and erosion from intensive rainfall, and failing water supply and
sewerage installations. Inappropriate alterations to the fort’s original drainage features over the
years have compounded the inability of the fort to properly drain water off its streets, through the
mori and down its slope.

The complex physical effects of the plumbing and sewerage with the walled city – inconceivable
to the city’s original builders – now undermine the stability of the entire complex. Because of
Jaisalmer’s desert location, dry masonry techniques were employed for the construction of the
fort. Now, the prolonged conditions of stagnating water and infiltration cause swelling of the
absorbent layer of clay-stone directly beneath the bastion’s sandstone foundations that promote
instability and structural failure.

Modern means of supplying water to the fort began in 1964 and was pumped from a well field on
the outskirts of Jaisalmer. The centuries-old need to haul water from Gadi Sagar Lake, a man-
made reservoir located two kilometers outside the fort’s walls, was made obsolete.
Experiences of the World Monuments Fund in Balancing Interpretation with Preservation
Paper submitted by Mark A. Weber, World Monuments Fund
95 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 – mweber@wmf.org – Tel: 646-424-9594 – Fax: 646-424-9593

In 1987, the 649-kilometer long Indira Gandhi Canal, which delivers water from the Punjab to
Rajasthan, was opened. Both the ecology of the Great Indian Desert and the lives of its people
changed dramatically. Irrigation was brought to once sandy plains, and surface water was
pumped to Jaisalmer to holding tanks for filtering and distribution. Records show that annual
rainfall over the past decade has increased as the climate has changed, and it has taken its toll
on Jaisalmer Fort.

Of the 469 historic properties with the fort, 87 have collapsed

and many more are in poor condition. The bearing pressure
on the saturated stone foundations of the signature round
bastions, originally lookout posts and homes of the Bhatti
warriors, has increased at an alarming pace. As the
popularity of adventure tourism grew, several bastions were
converted to boutique hotels, often with harmful results.
Inappropriate additions are compromising the structural
fitness and the character of the medieval fabric.

It was the above scenario that led to an awareness of the threats converging on Jaisalmer Fort,
and that resulted in it being listed on the Watch List, first in 1996, and again in 1998 and 2000.
The need for immediate action was underscored by the collapse of three of the forts upper
bastions and a section of the lower pitching wall during the unusually heavy monsoon rains of
1999.

Jaisalmer Heritage Interpretation Center at the Rani Ka Mahal (Queens Palace)

In 1998, WMF began its work in Jaisalmer with a pilot project

to rebuild a collapsed portion of the 17th c. Rani Ka Mahal,
one of three royal palaces within the fortified walls built to
accommodate the Rajput queens. A partnership was formed
with the Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage
(INTACH), UK based Jaisalmer in Jeopardy and the Giridar
Samarak Trust (the royal family’s trust), to document,
stabilize and ultimately conserve the standing portion of the
palace and to rebuild the collapsed wing.

During the first phase, it was decided to reconstruct the collapsed 18th c.
addition for use as a Heritage Interpretation Center to showcase the
area’s traditional crafts and the built and natural environments of
Jaisalmer Fort and the Thar Desert region.

The Heritage Center is housed in the restored portion of the palace and
presents the history of the Rani Ka Mahal and its role within the royal
court and the greater fort community. The Center has been organized
into six sections depicting history, ecology, art and crafts, fairs and
festivals, people and periods. In addition to raising the level of heritage
awareness, the pressing conservation challenges confronting the fort are
also presented to visitors and residents alike.

From the project’s inception, it was decided that there was a growing need to develop a multi-
disciplinary arts and crafts training center to benefit the fort’s residents thereby increasing the
sense of participation and belonging. This has been accomplished as well as maintaining the
continuity with the original function of the palace.

Since its opening in 2002, the Center has been successfully

training women to sew and embroider traditional textiles.
Experiences of the World Monuments Fund in Balancing Interpretation with Preservation
Paper submitted by Mark A. Weber, World Monuments Fund
95 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 – mweber@wmf.org – Tel: 646-424-9594 – Fax: 646-424-9593

These textiles and local handicrafts produced in the arts and crafts center are sold in the Center’s
new Heritage Shop, the profits of which go towards conservation projects. INTACH also realized
a need for a children’s library and activity center, now a popular destination for the children of
Jaisalmer. Today the combined programs and services provided by the Heritage Center are used
by up to 50 local citizens and children daily.

Stone carving workshops held on-site during the restoration

project have reinvigorated the dying tradition of carving
vernacular sandstone elements such as jarokhas, the
intricately carved projecting bays seen throughout Jaisalmer
that reflect the owner’s wealth and position in the community in
addition to drawing light and ventilation to the home’s interior.

Concurrent to the restoration of the Rani

Ka Mahal, INTACH and Jaisalmer in
Jeopardy can be credited with developing a successful street revitalization
program which vastly improved the fort community’s declining infrastructure
by installing toilets with proper sewage connections, repaving of the streets
and restoring facades with historically sympathetic materials.

The completed Rani Ka Mahal Heritage

Interpretation Center project is a good
example of how a conservation project based
on the use of traditional materials and techniques can inspire a
vibrant community-based program that benefits the local
populace while enhancing the visitor’s appreciation for the
region’s built and natural environment.

On-going Partnerships and Field Work

WMF has continued its partnership with INTACH and the original
stakeholders with the project to stabilize and restore the collapsed portions
of the Har Raj Ji Ka Mahal, King’s Palace, the most significant building
within the fort. Connected to the Rani Ka Mahal by an overhead
passageway perched atop the last gateway guarding the fort’s center, the
King’s Palace is also being converted into a museum.

As WMF monitored its projects within the fort, it continued to pursue the
larger overarching issues related to the water problems. WMF mounted
three technical assessment missions that resulted in a proposal for further
investigations and the development of short and long-term treatment plans.
An offer of challenge funding from WMF to the Government of India was
made and accepted. This spring, WMF finalized a new partnership by signing a Memorandum of
Understanding with the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) and the National Culture Fund to
begin a comprehensive plan to document and conserve Jaisalmer Fort.

Phase 1 work will begin this summer and will consist of the preparation of a
topographical map and a fabric conditions survey of fort’s defensive and
drainage systems. Hydrological, geo-technical and structural engineering
surveys will also be completed by an international team of consultants to help
guide the eventual site stabilization and restoration program.

The Bombay Collaborative will execute the architectural surveys and geo-
technical field investigations, while the ASI and the Geological Survey of
Experiences of the World Monuments Fund in Balancing Interpretation with Preservation
Paper submitted by Mark A. Weber, World Monuments Fund
95 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 – mweber@wmf.org – Tel: 646-424-9594 – Fax: 646-424-9593

India will prepare the topographical survey. WMF retained Sweco International, an architectural
and engineering firm based in Sweden, to consult on the development of a hydrological and geo-
technical field investigations program and prepare recommendations for drainage improvements
for Jaisalmer Fort. As luck would have it, WMF first learned of Sweco’s hydrological expertise in
Luxor where they were consulting for the Egyptian government on a project to control the high
ground water levels around the Luxor and Karnak Temples.