Alexander Gall
Portland, Oregon, USA

2003 US/ICOMOS Intern with the

Côa Valley Archaeological Park
in Portugal

Alex Gall conducted his internship with the Côa Valley Archaeological Park, the first archaeological park in Portugal.  The Côa Valley is a unique landscape known for its extensive record of thousands of years of human activity, including numerous examples of rock art.  The rock art in Côa Valley was inscribed on the World Heritage List in 1998 and the Alto Douro Wine Region, adjacent to Côa Valley, was inscribed on the World Heritage List as a cultural landscape in 2001.

The rock art sites were discovered during planning for construction of a dam on the Côa River which, if completed, would have resulted in the inundation of many of the rock art examples in the valley.  After public outcry, acrimonious political debate, and media attention, the creation of the archaeological park was begun with legislation passed in 1996.  Alex's responsibilities included survey and documentation of rock art and other sites throughout the valley. 

"If politics is nothing more than a struggle for power, then the Fox Côa affair attests to the power of profoundly significant heritage....  That so much political blood has been spilt over the rock art is a testimony to the value in preserving this resource of universal human significance."

Alex Gall
US/ICOMOS Intern
2003

This internship was sponsored by the Samuel H. Kress Foundation of New York.