The true PROFESSIONAL MEETING PLACE and a place of a shared quality achievement
Who is meeting whom?
- Meeting of museum and heritage professionals with various experts we cannot do without (architects, designers, consultants, information specialists, suppliers, tourism experts, media people etc.);
- Meeting of institutions and professionals from a broad range of practice and interest in the field of heritage to provide practical inspiration and create a rich mutual learning environment;
- Meeting of experienced veterans and ambitious, creative newcomers from the converging variety of professions in the field of heritage, all in the context of the information society;
- Meeting of minds and cultures: Dubrovnik has been, throughout its rich history, a geographical point where Mediterranean meets Central Europe, where West meets East, where North meets South.
- Meeting of museums, heritage and conservation professionals as an opportunity to check rising convergence through four shared objectives and circumstances: user orientation, societal mission, Information and communication technology and common theoretical basis.
Why the event?
The widening profession needs quality information and benchmarking occasions; there are, annually, we believe, more than a hundred awarded, new or renewed institutions world-wide and a great number of exceptional projects hardly known to the international professional public. All of them deserve further professional and public attention. Besides, we live in an increasingly competitive world where standards of excellence, i.e. expectations be it from public or our other stakeholders are rising steadily.
We find that all those who achieved quality and gained recognition may profit from our invitation to present themselves annually to the international community of professionals. Some will do it in Dubrovnik, thus becoming the members of Excellence Club while others, only nominated for the Excellence Club may do it on our web site. Presentations are structured is such a way as to produce the most usable picture of experience of the awarded project and its protagonists. The participants learn by the best examples while their "least" profit remains the inspiration, stemming from specific differences in the same, grand domain of heritage.
Presentations and discussions
Our presenters are not usually extraordinary professionals whose expertize has ben approved by a national or international award. Yet, as presenters, they are given clear instructions how to structure their presentation so that it answers most of your questions. Besides, every presentation is followed by a short discussion involving moderator and the participants. At the very end of the event, the moderators engage in panel discussion in which participants also take part.
What are the objectives?
The objective of "The Best in Heritage" is not to evaluate, nor give prizes or awards but presenting what is the best. Heritage and excellence being the only limits, we offer participants to see and hear about museums, galleries, visitor attractions as well as about conservation and exhibition centres, about real and virtual, CD-ROM, web sites etc., from actions to institutions..... The final list of the best achievers that will present themselves to the international public contains some 20 diverse experiences. To allow more participation, fresh spirit and innovation, we call one afternoon's programme of very brief plenary presentations the Creative Heritage Forum.
The introductory lecture by an international expert always offers an analysis of trends and tendencies in the heritage based professions. Our intention is to offer to the interested professionals every year a panorama of excellence recognized as such in the preceding year by the professional juries composed of the best professionals. The aim is to offer the abundance of excellent information and the opportunity to forge stable, fruitful professional connections and friendships in the unique atmosphere of medieval and Renaissance Dubrovnik. All the presentations are recorded on a superb DVD or available at this web site at Presentations and both present unique teaching material.
Our event is purposefully composed of diverse experiences within all-inclusive approach, unlike the usual specialist conferences. It is by intention that we are multidisciplinary and comprehensive. Our aim is to offer every year a new, fresh panorama of EXCELLENCE. When defining our aims, the first on the list would be INSPIRATION, - rightfully so as it is the term most often mentioned in questionnaires by our participants. Besides the positive professional knowledge our participants gain, we believe that is the best an organizer can offer.
We can do it with because we are not alone
The financial help from the Ministry of Culture of Croatia demonstrates official recognition of the manifestation. The very successful eight annual editions of the event confirm that the event is here to stay and develop further. With the recent partnership with Europa Nostra, we acquired wider impact and stressed more evidently the emerging unity of heritage profession(s).
The City of Dubrovnik, itself a World Heritage Site is sensitive to heritage and recognized the event by its high patronage. It is however the patronage of the world's museum organization (ICOM), UNESCO (Venice office), ICOMOS, Europa Nostra, ICCROM, and that of WFFM (World Federation of Friends of Museums) , that recommends it best to the future participants. They enlarged our conceptual and programme spread. Besides the ready assistance of the Croatian national committee of ICOM, the regional national committees of ICOM have also offered their support. All would be impossible, however, without the local partnership of Museums of Dubrovnik, local tourist organization and, of course, city administration.
As programme clearly shows, we grow, innovate and get better each year. Our partners and supporters grow in number and in significance. It is due to the partnership with Koelnmesse, at Exponatec Cologne Fair, that we have established Excellence Club, as valuable extension of our programme. The steady rise of the number of participants in Dubrovnik and the rising number of visits to our web site confirm that we proved ourselves useful to the professional community.
