VASILIKE ARGYROPOULOS

Vasilike Argyropoulos is a Professor in Conservation of Metals Conservation at the Dept. of Conservation of Antiquities & Works of Art, University of West Attica, Athens, Greece since 1998. Recently, she was a Visiting Professor at the University of Toronto, Museum Studies Program (March-September 2020). Since 1990, she has been involved in conservation of Cultural Heritage, which began with an international project with the University of Toronto to set-up a conservation laboratory at the Museum of Carthage in Tunisia.  

After her PhD, she was awarded a grant at the Historic Research Conservation Branch at Parks Canada, and carried out research on historical shipwrecks found underwater in the Marine Park of Fathom Five National Park. In 1994, she continued her research into archaeological metals, and was awarded a post-doc fellowship (3 years) at the Canadian Conservation Institute to develop treatments for terrestrial artefacts. She continued with research into the treatments for composite artefacts from shipwrecks in France, at ARC’Antique and ARC’Nucléart, in France (1997-1998). Between October 2000-March 2002, she was an academic co-ordinator and lecturer for the postgraduate Diploma course in Marine Archaeological Conservation, Conservation Studies, Vantaa, Finland.  

For the past 22 years, she has held an academic position at the University, and was successful in achieving full professorship in Metals Conservation. She has been responsible for teaching and creating a laboratory in her field where through various grants, she was able to equip her Lab with state-of-the-art equipment for diagnostic analysis and testing of metals. She has co-ordinated many European and International projects related to conservation of antiquity in the Europe and the Arab region, Egypt, Jordan, Tunisia, and Syria. Her main project was PROMET, EC 6th FP project No. 509126, Developing new analytical techniques and materials for monitoring and protecting metal artefacts from the Mediterranean region with 21 partners (2004-2008), and the EC Culture Programme No. 160674-CU-1-2009, Witness the past: educational programs for the public and CH professionals on illicit trafficking of antiquities (2010-2012). Her most recent national funded research project dealt with research on the corrosion and in-situ monitoring of iron shipwrecks in the Aegean Sea (2013-2015). 

She has supervised many conservation projects related to cultural heritage for sites and museums, Euphorates, and Municipalities in Greece by developing innovative approaches for such objects/monuments that are unique and difficult to treat, such as, an eight-ton iron paddle wheel lifted from the Shipwreck “Patris” (1868) in Greece. Her time in Europe for the past 22 years has allowed for her to participate in many committees involved in the conservation of cultural property. As the Convenor of European standards’ technical committee for the conservation of cultural property, CEN/TC 346 WG2, Materials constituting cultural property (2012-2016), as well as a board member for ENCoRE (European Network for Conservation-Restoration Education), and she believes strongly in the standardization of conservation practices and education throughout Europe and the Mediterranean basin in order to achieve international or trans-national mobility and quality assurance in the field of conservation of Cultural Heritage. Just recently, she was a guest speaker at the International Conference on Climate Change Impacts on Cultural Heritage held in Athens, Greece in June 2019, where the concluding documents was presented at United Nations, COPA25. She has supervised many Ph.D. and Masters Students, and undergraduate dissertations involving research in conservation of cultural heritage, as well as has organized many international workshops, conferences, and diploma courses for conservation and conservation science. Finally, she has around 70 peer reviewed publications, as well as edited books and journals related to conservation of cultural heritage.