Prof. Dr. Michael Petzet, born 1933, has been President of the German National Committee of ICOMOS since 1989 and previously was President of ICOMOS International between 1999 and 2008. He studied art history and archaeology in Munich and Paris. After many years with the Bavarian State Conservation Office and the Bavarian Administration of Historic Palaces, he became Vice Director of the Central Institute for the History of Art and organized the exhibition of the Bavarian State and the City of Munich on the occasion of the 1972 Olympic Summer Games.
From 1972 to 1974 he was director of the Lenbachhaus, the Art Museum of the City of Munich. For 25 years (1974–1999), in his position as Conservator General, Professor Petzet directed the Bavarian State Conservation Office, the central authority for the protection and conservation of monuments and sites in Bavaria. He is the author of numerous books and articles on French architecture of the 17th and 18th centuries, on monuments and sites in Bavaria, and on general problems of monument conservation. He is the editor of several series of publications on conservation (Heritage at Risk, Monuments and Sites).
