Bartolomé Ruiz González (Casabermeja,éRuizGonzá Málaga, 1954) is a Spanish archaeologist who has been involved in cultural management in Andalucia since the late 1970s. He currently runs the Archaeological Ensemble of the Antequera Dolmens and is the director of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of Antequera.
Education and research activity
He received his Philosophy and Arts degree in Geography and History from the University of Málaga in 1977. He was unanimously granted the distinction of Cum Laude for his undergraduate Thesis entitled “La Carta Prehistórica de la Provincia de Málaga”, overseen by Professor Antonio Arribas Palau at the University of Granada in 1980. Throughout those years, under the guidance of Professors José Enrique Ferrer Palma and Ignacio Marqués Merelo, Ruiz González carried out archaeological excavation work at different prehistoric necropolises in the provinces of Málaga -Casabermeja, Ronda and Antequera-, Cádiz -El Gastor-, and Granada -Fonelas-, as well as a series of excavation campaigns at the cave of Las Palomas de Teba (Málaga). He later worked at the Cave of Nerja with Prehistory Professors Manuel Pellicer Catalán and Francisco Jordá Cerdán. In 1988 he visited the Royal Academy of Spain in Rome as a Resident in order to gain a better understanding of the Italian management model for the guardianship of cultural and environmental assets. His research activity thus focused on three areas: archaeology, heritage and cultural management.
Nowadays he is a scientific collaborator in the research on the cave of El Toro (El Torcal, Antequera, Málaga), conducted within the framework of the R&D&I Projects: HAR2011-29068 (2012-2015, Lead Investigator Dimas Martín Socas) ‘’Society, Technology and Artisan Specialisation. The first rural societies and social hierarchy in the south of the Iberian Peninsula (5th – 3rd millennium B.C.)’’; and HAR2012-38857 (2013-2016, Lead Investigator María Dolores Camalich Massieu) ‘’Technology and Society: specialisation and artisan diversification in eastern Andalusia between the 6th – 3rd millennium B.C.’’ He is also a Researcher on the project R&D&I HAR2013-45149-P (2014-2017, Lead Investigator Leonardo García Sanjuán) ‘’Nature, Society and Monumentality: High Resolution Archaeological Investigations on the Megalithic Landscape of Antequera".
Career
He is a civil servant of the Senior Governmental Body of the Regional Government of Andalusia, serving as a Historical Heritage Curator and Archaeologist and having held various senior positions in the Administration of the Provincial Government of Málaga and the Regional Government of Andalusia with the duties of Expert Technician, Management and Senior Management on issues concerning cultural management and actions for the guardianship of Historical Heritage (administration, research, protection, preservation and dissemination).
Archaeologist for the Architecture, Urban Development and Territorial Planning Service of the Provincial Government of Málaga (1979-1983) He established the Department of Archaeology of the Provincial Government of Málaga, developing Provincial Archaeology Plans, several “archaeological reports” for different planning instruments and the “Catalogue of Archaeological Sites in the Province of Málaga” as an instrument for the protection of Archaeological Heritage. There started to be talk about urban and preventive archaeology, planning and rescue excavations…; in short, new terminology that was quickly incorporated into archaeological language. This “Archaeological Methodology for urban planning”, ground-breaking in Andalusia and Spain, led to the award of the National Urban Planning Prize in 1980.
Director General of Cultural Heritage for the Ministry of Culture of the Regional Government of Andalusia (1983-1984) With Rafael Escudero Rodríguez as president of the Regional Government of Andalusia and Rafael Román Guerrero as the Minister for Culture.