SWITZERLAND MAKES OFFER TO UNOG MODULAR SYSTEM FOR EXHIBITIONS, RESTORATION OF FRESCOS IN DELEGATES’ SALON TO MARK ITS ENTRY TO UN

SWITZERLAND MAKES OFFER TO UNOG MODULAR SYSTEM FOR EXHIBITIONS, RESTORATION

OF FRESCOS IN DELEGATES’ SALON TO MARK ITS ENTRY TO UN

(Reissued as received.)

GENEVA, 5 September (UN Information Service) -- Switzerland announced today that in order to mark its admission to the United Nations, it would offer the United Nations Office at Geneva (UNOG) a modular system for exhibitions, as well as the restoration of the embellishment of the Delegates’ Salon at the Palais des Nations.  The Director-General of UNOG, Sergei Ordhzonikidze, has highly appreciated this move, which witnesses once again the close relationships and conviviality that the United Nations and their host country maintain.

The Swiss designer of the workshop of Greutmann Bolzern of Zurich conceived the modular system for exhibition, which will be offered by Switzerland.  It comprises a large billboards connected to each other by transparent plastic pieces.  The whole billboard was supplemented by elements of plinth and elements covered in glass, thus creating an impression of space.  The gift was made at a time when the number of expositions held at the Palais des Nations each year was increasing.

The frescos of the “Salon des Délégués” that Switzerland is committed to restore are the work of the Swiss artist Karl Hügin and had been offered by Switzerland to the League of Nations in 1937.

The Federal Council plans to officially hand over the gift in March 2004, during the opening ceremony of the sixtieth session of the Commission on Human Rights and within the context of an art exhibition on the theme of human rights that would be presented for this occasion at the Palais des Nations.  The system of exhibition and the restoration of the portraits represented what one could call “the part of Geneva” of the gift of Switzerland on the occasion of its admission to the United Nations, “the part of New York” being translated by the redevelopment of complex of halls situated at the heart of the General Assembly in New York.

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