Mobile Station for Preserving Cultural Heritage in Odesa
A new mobile station ARK 1 has arrived in Odesa, equipped with modern technologies for cleaning, disinfection, drying, and restoring documents. This project was made possible through the funding of the ALIPH Foundation and the support of the Ukrainian Library Association.
The first such station reached Ukraine in January 2025. Its compact size (6 × 2.3 meter container) allows for rapid deployment without special machinery, and it can operate on a generator in the absence of electricity.
From March to August, specialists processed over 350 documents, including about 200 books from the late 19th to early 20th century from university libraries, 30-35 newspaper collections from the Kherson Regional Universal Scientific Library, and more than 70 archival documents from the funds of the National Bank of Ukraine, the National Historical Library, and others.
Now Odesa, home to a unique cultural heritage and under constant threat from shelling, has a tool for rapid response to damage to library collections. In October, training sessions will be held for librarians in the city on document preservation.
This initiative is being implemented jointly by the National Library of Ukraine named after Yaroslav the Wise, the National Library of the Czech Republic, the Czech ICOM Committee, and the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic, with support from the Ministry of Culture and Strategic Communications of Ukraine.
The project is financed by the charitable foundation of the Komarek family and several international donors. The National Library of Ukraine serves as the coordinator in Ukraine, while the Ukrainian Library Association is the strategic partner.
