Early August, EXARC Director Paardekooper visited the headquarters of the International Council of Museums, ICOM, in Paris. EXARC is an affiliated organisation to ICOM, representing archaeological open-air museums. ICOM has almost 30,000 members worldwide, all working in or with museums. 
Paardekooper met with the President of ICOM, Suay Aksoy and the Director General, Dr Peter Keller. We discussed the nature of archaeological open-air museums and the great bandwidth in this category. We looked back on the cooperation between ICOM and EXARC since 2009. EXARC was present at the conventions in Rio (2013) and Milan (2016) and will probably also attend Kyoto (2019). We are in contact with several international and national committees. EXARC itself is an active affiliated organisation and well accepted by ICOM. 
The President urged EXARC to remain in close contact and attend the annual meetings in Paris where possible. Thankfully, Paris is only a short trip away from the EXARC office in the Netherlands.