We are glad to present to you the lecture on recent archaeological projects in Sri Lanka, in collaboration with France (CNRS), Germany (German Archaeological Institute) and the US (University of Berkeley). In a multidisciplinary perspective, joining archaeology, art history, anthropology of techniques and digital humanities, three projects will be highlighted:
- Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara as protector of seafarers. Results of the Avalokiteśvara survey project in Sri Lanka
- GIS-based heritage data management system for world heritage city of Anuradhapura
- Giribawa, An Ancient Glass-Making site of the first millennium CE
Speakers
Ariane de Saxcé is an archaeologist specialized on trade and cultural exchanges in the Indian Ocean. She received her PhD from the University of Paris-Sorbonne, after a pre-doctoral Fellowship at the Getty Research Institute in Los Angeles. Her thesis dealt with transfers and interactions between the Mediterranean, South India and Sri Lanka (3 rd c. BCE – 7 th c. CE). For her post-doctoral research at the École pratique des hautes études (Paris), she worked on religious and cultural contacts of Sri Lanka at the early medieval period. Now Research Associate for South and South-East Asia at the German Archaeological Institute (KAAK Bonn), she has started new collaborative projects for excavations in Sri Lanka.
Professor Osmund Bopearachchi is a Professor of Central and South Asian Art and Archaeology at the UC Berkeley, and Emeritus Director of Research at the C.N.R.S.-E.N.S. Paris. He holds B.A. from the University of Kelaniya (Sri Lanka), and B.A. honours, M.A., M.Phil., Ph.D. from the Paris 1 Sorbonne University, and a Higher Doctorate (Habilitation) from the Paris 4 Sorbonne University. He is a numismatist, art historian and archaeologist. He has received prestigious international awards for his publications. French Academy of Inscriptions and Belles-Lettres has awarded the most prestigious prizes to five of his works, including “George Perrot Medal” for From Bactria to Taprobane: Selected Works of Osmund Bopearachchi, vol. I. Central Asian and Indian Numismatics; vol. II. Art History and Maritime Trade, Manohar Publishers, New Delhi, 2015 and Ikuo Hiriyama Award for When West Met East: Gandhāran Art Revisted, Manohar, New Delhi in 2020.
Nuwan Abeywardane is a Professor attached to the Department of Archaeology and Heritage Management of the Rajarata University of Sri Lanka. In 2005 he was able to qualify himself by obtaining a first class honors degree for Bachelor of Arts in Archaeology from the University of Peradeniya. Meantime, he was awarded two scholarships for Academic Excellence and Greatest Competence at the General Convocation. He completed his Master of Science in GIS and remote sensing at Post Graduate Institute of Science, University of Peradeniya, in 2009 with a GPA of 3.81. In 2009 he joined the Government Department of Archaeology as a research assistant and contributed to several field explorations and excavations island wide. Nuwan joined the Department of Archaeology and Heritage Management at Rajarata University of Sri Lanka as a young Lecturer in 2011. He is a senior academic and a researcher now. He completed his Doctor of Science degree in Landscape Archaeology from the Freie University, Berlin, Germany, in 2019. He is an ICCROM alumnus and completed the Conservation of Built Heritage Course in 2014 at ICCROM, Rome, Italy. Further, he had his heritage and GIS education from Japan, Thailand, and India. He is a member of the Sri Lanka Council of Archaeologists.