The management of Modern architectural heritage in Guatemala through a multidisciplinary approach

Abstract

he Ministry of Culture and Sports of Guatemala requested DoCoMoMo Guatemala to lead the technical committee in charge of preparing the necessary documentation to present the capital’s Civic Center as a candidate to become a National Heritage site. Each of the four buildings belonging to the first phase of construction (the Municipality of Guatemala MUNIGUATE, the Guatemalan Social Security Institute IGSS, the Bank of Guatemala BANGUAT and the National Mortgage Bank CHN) were already individually listed as National Heritage buildings, since they are part of the first urban compound designed and built in Guatemala which integrates the plastic arts as part of its morphological expression. The declaration of the compound as a National Heritage site would be a preliminary step to propose it as a World Heritage Site. A multidisciplinary group was called upon to constitute the committee, with representatives from all parties concerned: government agencies (Ministry of Culture and Sports and Municipality of Guatemala, public and private academic institutions (San Carlos National University, and Rafael Landivar University) and civil society (DoCoMoMo Guatemala, and González Goyri Foundation).