UNESCO Recognition Project – Panoramas as Memory of the World

The IPC mandated a commission in 2023 with the aims of establishing the recognition of painted panoramas (as a media art form and a social phenomenon inside the UNESCO “Memory of the World” (MoW) program.The project is expected to span 2023–2028 and IPC invites heritage panorama owners and/or custodians of panorama artifacts worldwide, members or non-.members of IPC, to contribute to this new mission and thereby to the recognition of panoramas as a documentary world heritage.

The Memory of the World Programme was established in 1992 (the founding year of IPC) with the aim of facilitating the preservation of the world’s past, present and future documentary heritage, assisting universal access to documentary heritage, and increasing awareness worldwide of the existence and significance of documentary heritage and thereby fosters dialogue and mutual understanding between people and cultures.

Proposed Timeline

• 2023 Presentation of the project
  
• 2024 IPC member and non-member survey
  
• 2024 IPC conference with scientific exchange on the topic
  
• 2025 Constitution of national groups based on eligibility criteria
  
• 2025 IPC conference with scientific exchange on the topic
• 2025 Preparation of national applications
• 2026 Submission of the application
• 2028 Notification of Decision

The operational committee of this IPC commission is composed of IPC members including Prof. Sarah Kenderdine (Laboratory for Experimental Museology, EPFL); Dominique Hanson (former Director of the Army Museum of Brussels); and Dr. Daniel Jaquet (IPC Executive Board Member and Council member of the Foundation for the Panorama of the Battle of Murten).

The scientific committee of this IPC commission is composed of Molly Briggs (IPC President and faculty of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, USA), Gabriele Koller (IPC Vice President and Jerusalem Panorama Foundation Altötting, Germany), Seth Thompson (IPC member and American Univeristy of Sharjah, UAE) and Erkki Huhtamo (IPC member and faculty of the University of California Los Angelesa, USA). Victor Flores (University of Lisbon, Portugal), Bart Moens (IPC member and Antwerp University, Belgium).

Following the 2024 survey interest and the exchanges during the 33rd IPC conference (Lausanne, Switzerland), the eligibility criteria for the list of panoramas, as well as the requirements for the panorama owners/custodians were presented in an online meeting in March 2025.Two lists were established and presented to the General Assembly in 2025: One selective list of volunteering panorama owners/custodians matching the criteria; another exhaustive list of preserved panoramas. The scientific committee presented a position paper at the 34th IPC conference (Lisbon, Portugal). This paper will be published as an article in December 2025 in the International Journal for Stereo & Immersive Media, alongside with the second list as an appendix.

The list for the application is not yet closed, and the application preparation will enter the operational phase in 2026-2027, with the support of the Swiss UNESCO Office, which will coordinate the submission prepared by the commission. This choice is based on the location of the seat of IPC, in Switzerland, but will include international cooperation of all the locations of the panorama owners/custodians listed.