Barcelona, Brasília, Madrid, Nizhny Novgorod and Sarajevo have elected the 7 wonders of their material cultural heritage

The International Bureau of Cultural Capitals (www.ibocc.org) has promoted, during the month of June, 2008, the election of 7 wonders of the material cultural heritage of Barcelona, Brasília, Madrid, Nizhny Novgorod and Sarajevo. As said by Xavier Tudela, President of the Bureau, these five cities or regions represent very well “the variety and richness of the international material cultural heritage”.

The election took place during the month of june simultaneously in these five areas of the world. En each one of the cities there were 25 candidatures and, by citizens vote, in which thousands of people took part, each city or region have elected their 7 most representative sites. After the election process is completed, the 7 local wonders of Barcelona, Brasília, Madrid, Nizhny Novgorod and Sarajevo are as follows:

Barcelona

1) Sagrada Familia

2) Santa Maria del Mar Church

3) Palace of the Catalan Music

4) Milà House or the Pedrera House

5) The Great Lyceum Theatre

6) Batlló House

7) Agbar Tower

Brasília, F.D.

1) Brasilia Cathedral

2) National Congress

3) Alvorada Palace

4) Planalto Palace

5) Good Will Temple

6) Dom Bosco Sanctuary

7) JK Bridge (Juscelino Kubischek)

Community of Madrid

1) San Lorenzo Monastery at El Escorial

2) Royal Palace in Madrid

3) University and historical in Alcalá de Henares

4) Mayor Square in Chinchón

5) Prado Museum

6) Cultural Landscape of Aranjuez

7) Mayor Square in Madrid

Nizhny Novgorod Region

1) Cultural landscape of the Volga slope

2) Blagoveschensky (Annunciation) monastery complex

3) Nativity of Our Lord and Synaxis of the Most Holy Theotokos church (Rozhdestvenskaya Soboro-Bogoroditskaya, called Stroganov’s)

4) Nizhny Novgorod Citadel ("Kremlin". The walls and towers)

5) “Garantiya” and “Titanic” buildings

6) Fair Palace

7) Saint Alexander Nevsky Cathedral

Sarajevo Canton

1) Old town part of Sarajevo (Baš?aršija)

2) Beg’s mosque complex

3) Hadji Sinan’s house

4) Emperor’s mosque complex

5) National Library

6) Ali-Pasha’s mosque

7) Old Orthodox Church

The election of the 7 wonders of the material cultural heritage of Barcelona, Brasília, Madrid, Nizhny Novgorod and Sarajevo has taken as a reference the universally recognised 7 wonders of the Ancient world. Those were the Great Cheops Pyramid at Giza, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, the Temple of Artemisia at Ephesus, the Statue of Zeus at Olympia, the Mausoleum of Maussollos at Halicarnassus, the Colossus of Rhodes, and the Lighthouse of Alexandria.

The International Bureau of Cultural Capitals has promoted the election by citizens of the 7 wonders of the material cultural heritage of Barcelona, Brasília, Madrid, Nizhny Novgorod and Sarajevo with the wish to spread the heritage in a didactic, pedagogic, recreational way and, at the same time, to cause the selected and elected sites to be visited as well as to establish new tourist routes allowing the visitors to acknowledge the richness of the international heritage in a synthetic manner.

The International Bureau of Cultural Capitals has created and is evolving the American Capital of Culture, the Capital of the Catalan Culture, the Brazilian Capital of Culture, the US Capital of Culture and other projects establishing cultural capitals. The Bureau’s goals are to promote and evolve the cultural capitals created by this body; to co-ordinate activities with the other cultural capitals existing in the world; to promote the creation of cultural capitals in the areas of the world where they don’t exist yet; to collaborate with cultural institutions and entities in order to achieve common goals; to provide consulting to public and private institutions on evolvement of cultural projects and, finally, to directly evolve cultural initiatives all over the world like the election of the 7 wonders of the cultural material heritage of Barcelona, Brasília, Madrid, Nizhniy Novgorod and Sarajevo. Xavier Tudela is the president of the International Bureau of Cultural Capitals.

2008-07-18