Aurora Humanitarian Initiative to Grant US $20,000 to the Matenadaran

On October 8, the Feast of the Holy Translators, the Aurora Humanitarian Initiative has decided to grant US $20,000 to the Yerevan Mesrop Mashtots Research Institute of Ancient Manuscripts, the Matenadaran, to facilitate making Armenian culture more accessible to foreign visitors, the official website of Aurora Prize informs. 

 

The grant will fund the training of ten Matenadaran guides. They will travel to Germany to visit museums and cultural centers in Germany to identify and learn the newest principles of museum management and presentation, and to develop skills necessary for museum guides who work in foreign languages. 

 

“Matenadaran has always valued the importance of sharing information. We pay huge attention to professional competence of our guides. This project is enormously important and we are pleased that this partnership grows and is becoming strategic,” said Ara Khzmalyan, Advisor to the Director of Matenadaran. 

 

This is the second instance of cooperation between the Aurora Humanitarian Initiative and the Matenadaran as a project of the Armenian Memory Act. In 2015, the Matenadaran received US $25 000 grant to purchase a special scanner to digitize manuscripts making them more accessible for researchers and the wider public. 700 manuscripts and rare archive documents have been digitalized since the beginning of the project. The process of digitization is ongoing. The Armenian Memory Act, subproject of Aurora Initiative, is committed to enhancing the preservation and use of archives and documentation of the Armenian experience.