Scholar Ximena Baldiviezo Visits From Bolivia

Walking down Main Street, Newark, DE, a crisp autumn spring breeze on her face, Ximena Baldiviezo breaks into a smile, declaring, “Yes, I’m here.”

The joy and pride in her expression reveal the true depth of her words. The road to Winterthur and the University of Delaware has not been an easy one for Ximena. Her journey is one of determination, endurance, and passion.

Born and raised in Cochabamba, Bolivia, Ximena graduated from Universidad Mayor de San Simon with a degree in architecture. Her early jobs included teaching English at a music institute, where she developed a love for playing the violin. This interest in culture led her to accept a position in a two year program for restoration at La Escuela Taller Santa Teresa. She specialized in wooden objects, but soon expanded to paintings and architecture.

After working in the cloister for three years, Ximena felt passionately about a project to convert portions of the building into a museum. She applied to the AIC to present her work and raise awareness at the annual conference, held in Denver, Colorado in April 2008. She was approved by the AIC, but the American embassy denied her visa. So Ximena wrote a letter, and another letter, and another. She asked the AIC and the restorers at La Escuela Taller Santa Teresa to write letters. Ximena sent a flood of letters to the embassy until her visa was approved. Ximena attended the 2008 AIC conference in Denver and presented her work. She calls the experience “strange and wonderful,” describing the room full of conservators as her first experience of conservation as “a real profession.”

Hearing about the conservation program at Winterthur, Ximena contacted WUDPAC and was offered the opportunity to visit the conservation program. She contrasts her experience of conservation at WUDPAC with her conservation experience in Bolivia, saying that the conservation practiced at WUDPAC uses more science and analytical tests in treatments, while her conservation experience in Bolivia placed a heavier emphasis on art historical context and eye-examination. Ximena hopes to spread her newly acquired knowledge to her colleagues in Bolivia in order to “awake in them a little seed on their approach to conservation.” Musing upon her time here, she states, “This is going to shake things. I don’t know how to approach my job now. This is going to shake things.”

Outside again, Ximena breathes in deeply, remembering the past that got her where she is today and imagining the possibilities of the future. “Yes,” she says with hard-earned confidence, “I’m here. I’m becoming a conservator.”

by Marlene Yandrisevits ‘11

October 23, 2008