<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?> <docID>336140</docID> <postdate>2025-01-05 13:42:18</postdate> <headline>Canberra conservator joins Antarctic odyssey</headline> <body><p><img class=" wp-image-336142" src="https://citynews.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/Daniel-Bornstein-e1736044805974.jpg" alt="" width="900" height="599" /></p> <caption>National Museum conservator Daniel Bornstein says the expedition is "the trip of a lifetime". Photo: Heritage Expeditions</caption> <p><span class="kicker-line">By <strong>Emily Verdouw</strong></span></p> <p><strong>From the quiet confines of his conservation lab to the icy wilderness of Antarctica, a young conservator is about to head off on the expedition of a lifetime. </strong></p> <p>As the sole Australian selected for New Zealand's Antarctic Heritage Trust's Inspiring Explorers Expedition, 32-year-old Daniel Bornstein will walk in the footsteps of legendary adventurers Robert Falcon Scott and Ernest Shackleton.</p> <p>The team will set off from NZ on Tuesday on a month-long journey to Scott's Discovery Hut and back.</p> <p>Mr Bornstein's mission includes returning a treasured artefact to the historic hut that once sheltered the famous explorers.</p> <p>"Just to think that I might be kind of walking ... in the steps of these kind of heroic age explorers ... it really is the trip of a lifetime," he told AAP.</p> <p>His expertise as a conservator at the National Museum of Australia in Canberra - spanning a vast array of objects from historic paddle steamers to delicate musical instruments - makes Mr Bornstein uniquely suited to the challenges of this expedition.</p> <p>It is his role to restore and return a copy of The Count of Monte Cristo, a soot-stained, battered book found outside Scott's Discovery Hut in the early 1960s.</p> <p>"You can see just how much that object was loved or needed by the people who were on this expedition," he said.</p> <p>"There are grimy, sooty fingerprints on every page. It's an amazing insight into how they survived those conditions and what they valued."</p> <p><img class="size-full wp-image-336141" src="https://citynews.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/antarctica-e1736044861729.jpg" alt="" width="800" height="533" /></p> <caption>Daniel Bornstein is joining an Antarctic expedition retracing the steps of legendary explorers. Photo: Heritage Expeditions</caption> <p>Mr Bornstein's work involves more than preserving physical objects - it's about ensuring their stories endure.</p> <p>"The job really is thinking about what makes an object culturally meaningful or significant and how you preserve that moving forward," he said.</p> <p>"Sometimes it means sacrificing functionality for aesthetics, or the opposite."</p> <p>Preparing for the journey, Mr Bornstein crafted a wax canvas anorak, inspired by the attire of heroic age explorers, whose canvas garments famously struggled in the wet and icy conditions.</p> <p>"I figure I've got the luxury of the heritage trust - they probably won't let me die over there - so I'm testing just how bad it really is," he said with a laugh.</p> <p>The Antarctic Heritage Trust, based in NZ, is dedicated to preserving the legacy of the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration.</p> <p>Its efforts include conserving historic expedition huts and 20,000 artefacts left behind by early explorers, sharing these stories to inspire future generations.</p> <p>"These huts represent so many interesting questions around the conservation of objects in extreme and isolated conditions," Mr Bornstein said.</p> <p>"They force a pragmatic philosophy to our trade and the way that we do things."</p> <p>He said the journey was a rare opportunity to connect with history, test conservation techniques and learn from an international team of inspiring explorers.</p> <p>"It's about understanding the complexities of history and ensuring future generations can learn from them."</p> </body>