Conservation of the Gandhara Scroll: A Successful Collaboration
Holly Huston Krueger
Senior Paper Conservator
Conservation Division
February 11 , 2009
About the Lecture:
Buddhism is one of the world’s major religions and can trace its origins to 450 BC when its founder, Guatama Buddha, attained enlightenment under the Bodhi tree. Buddhism spread northward from India into the Peshawar Valley, present day Northern Pakistan and Afghanistan. The region, Gandhara, stood as a thriving center for Buddhism before spreading eastward along the Silk Roads. Until recently, no original manuscripts had been found documenting the development of the Gandharan doctrine of Buddhism. A group of materials dating from 1st c BC to 2nd c BCE were unearthed in the 1990’s, and the Library of Congress acquired a birch-bark scroll from this collection. It fell to the Library’s Conservation Division to unroll, document and devise a long-term preservation strategy for this most fragile and ancient object. To accomplish this task, conservators relied upon a myriad of colleagues and expertise, both inside and outside of its own walls.
About the Speaker:
Holly Huston Krueger
Holly Huston Krueger is a 1982 Graduate of the Cooperstown Graduate Program for Conservation. She has worked at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and the Western Regional Paper Conservation Laboratory. In 1984, she re-located to Dallas, Texas where she was the Conservator at the Amon Carter Museum in Fort Worth. In 1992, Holly joined the Library of Congress Conservation Division in Washington, D.C., where she is presently a Senior Paper Conservator.
