Digital meets Culture

12th of March 2019, Coventry, UK

Successful REACH- Workshop on Participatory Approaches for creativity and Entrepreneurship

The REACH project recently held its latest workshop, hosted by Coventry University’s Centre for Dance Research. It had a wide ranging brief that, in addition to considering the REACH theme of participatory approaches, it also incorporated creative and entrepreneurial (re)-use of cultural and heritage.

A programme of speakers was developed to cover the themes of the workshop from a number of perspectives.
The morning session included Sarah Whatley (Coventry University) providing an overview of intangible cultural heritage and EU projects within the context of participatory and creative (re-)use. The next speaker, Maria Ralli (National Technical University of Athens) outlined the E-Space Portal/WITH’s federated search functionality that would enable the (re-)use of cultural content, as well as Crowd Heritage via the Crowdsourcing Platform for enriching Cultural Heritage assets. For any digitised (re-)use, it is important to consider copyright issues and this is what was covered by Charlotte Waelde (Coventry University) in her presentation of heritage sensitive intellectual property strategies for intangible cultural heritage.

The next session started with Daniel Ockeleon (Noterik) using Qandr, an interactive tool for audience participation to ask questions of attendees. He then demonstrated MuPop/the pop-up museum and showed how to enhance a museum visitor’s experience and interaction via a mobile device. The museum theme was considered in a more traditional way, as Graham Black (Nottingham Trent University) described museums in the age of participation and the deliberations of institutions evaluating how to attract modern audiences. The final presentation of the morning was from Sally Hartshorne (University of Leicester) who provided stories of Leicester’s Cultural Quarter and described how places and spaces could be creatively (re)-used and their past highlighted to inform both residents and visitors.

The afternoon began with Richard Tomlins (Coventry University) providing an energetic demonstration of sprinting the creative economy and how he had worked with different groups to disrupt their thinking and challenge them to consider new approaches and solutions. Next was Dom Breadmore (Ludic Rooms) who showcased the work of his small organisation within the cultural heritage sector (including links to Coventry: UK City of Culture 2021) by discussing open citizens: postdigital participation through play. The final presenter within this entrepreneurial themed session was Antonella Fresa (Promoter) who described the important role that DigitalMeetsCulture, the online cultural heritage magazine ,plays within the heritage sector for sharing news, raising awareness and building partnerships.

The day was considered to have been a great success, with themes of (re-)use, creativity, entrepreneurship and participation presented in a number of ways, each providing attendees and the REACH project with further areas for discussion.

Workshp webpage and Photo gallery

Interactive Art Installation in Veliko Tarnovo, Bulgaria

Interaction with a biobot, by Co-Interaction Art Group

“Co-Interaction” is an Art group dedicated to the implementation of Hi-tech assisted artistic projects, composed by Svetoslav Kosev and Atanas Markov. Their new art installation, presented in Veliko Tarnovo on 15th March, is a natural corollary to two former interactive projects, namely “INTERACTIVE GENERATIVE FORMATIONS” and “VIRTUAL ARENA”.

That’s how Svetoslav describes the project:

The essential difference between the new project and the previous ones is that in the former action takes place on a two-dimensional plane, on which images are being projected. The objects’ aesthetics is pre-defined and the movement of both viewers and participants in the installation is detected by a sensor. Thus, the viewers alter the appearance of the dynamic images on the go and become active part in their construction and perception.

With the project “INTERACTION WITH A BIOBOT”, we leave the two-dimensional plane and venture into three-dimensional space. The dimensions of the installation “event box” are 500х500х350 см. While discussing the project we came up with the idea to imitate a living organism that is able to react to “the threat” of approaching viewers. This idea is modeled over a behavioral reaction of a group of plants depicted in the movie “Avatar”. In the movie the protagonist touches a plant which triggers an instant reaction by all other members of the group of plants which withdraw within their roots. To design an installation of the desired scale within the viewers’ step-in zone however is quite risky. That is why we decided to raise the whole installation and the objects above viewers’ heads, which, of course, is much more complicated as an engineering solution and necessitates the involvement of an expert in the respective field.

The other problem that we had to solve concerned the nature of the object that was supposed to react to the participants’ presence and what type of reaction to model. It was at this point that I was reminded of a game children play on the beach. It involved throwing of a small spherical ball that expands in flight but contracts upon impact and squeeze. Later on it turned out that this toy was known in the scientific circles as the “Hoberman sphere”. We made a couple of experiments with “the ball” and it turned out that it can be made to expand and contract to pre-defined parameters with the aid of servo mechanisms. Then, on the basis of all the initially considered elements, the whole construction for the installation was designed. Naturally there were some problems within the process of construction. These were primarily related to the electronic circuits and Atanas had to solve them on the spot, which he masterfully did.

All in all, our cooperation in which I contributed with the conceptual and the visual part, Atanas was entirely engaged with the technical part, and engineer Anton Krustev contributed with the construction design, lead to the completion of the project and the new installation.

Co-Interaction website: http://www.co-interaction.com/co-interaction/index.php/en/

online event 8-12 April 2019

OPF JHOVE Hack Week

The Open Preservation Foundation will be running two online hack weeks during 2019. The first, which will take place on 8-12 April, will focus on development. A second hack week will take place in September, with a goal to update and create new documentation.

What’s the goal?

The aim of the development hack week is to improve JHOVE for the benefit of its users. We plan to concentrate on the ‘quick fixes’ to reduce JHOVE’s issue list and make it easier to assign bug fixes and new features to future releases. There’s a variety of tasks so everyone should be able to find something they can work on given the time, knowledge and skills available to them.

Why participate?

We need your help! JHOVE is an open source validation tool that is widely used across the global digital preservation community. It is free to download, use and amend to meet your organisation’s requirements. However, it is not free to host, maintain or develop. Only OPF members support JHOVE financially through part of their membership fees.

We are only a small team and are responsible for maintaining other tools in addition to JHOVE. We receive development effort contributions on an ad hoc basis from our members and the digital preservation community so would like to say a big THANK YOU to everyone who helps to improve JHOVE for the benefit of the whole community.

More details and registration available at: https://openpreservation.org/event/jhove-hack-week-april-2019/

Enrol now for this FREE MOOC, starting in May 2019

Tourism Management at UNESCO World Heritage Sites – MOOC

Enrolments are now open for the second volume of the MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) on Tourism Management at UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Anyone is welcome to register regardless of whether they have participated in the first volume or not!

The great success of the first volume (more than 6’500 learners from 166 countries) spurred the release of this brand new open online course. It is designed and run by the international university network UNESCO UNITWIN Network “Culture, Tourism, and Development”, led by Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University (Paris, France).

Highly profiled researchers in the field share their knowledge on the main aspects of this topic and provide insights into the main tourism issues at UNESCO World Heritage Sites, specifically tackling such matters as heritage communication, management and marketing.

Each instructor provides a unique view on the topic, so as to form a rich and various concert of voices.

Such a free online course might be of great interest for Professionals in the Tourism Industry, Policy Makers, Researchers, Students… especially if they are committed to promoting tourism at sites of Outstanding Universal Value, while at the same time concerned with their conservation.

The course, in English, is completely free and open, and is going to be delivered at the start of May 2019 on the major French platform, FUN MOOC. It is organized in 6 thematic units, unveiled every week. Their structure foresees ad-hoc didactic videos and documents, as well as quizzes, additional materials, and activities aimed at fostering experience sharing among participants. Learners successfully completing the course will then receive a free course completion certificate.

For further information and to register, please visit the following page:

https://www.fun-mooc.fr/courses/course-v1:Paris1+16012+session01/about

Open until 31 March 2019

RURITAGE Project Call of Interest for Replicators

Are you a rural community that is searching for innovative solutions, using your local heritage potential as a catalyst for economic competitiveness and/or sustainable and inclusive growth?
The RURITAGE project, funded under H2020, is looking for 6 rural areas located primarily in the EU and in the EEA and 3 in the16 ENP countries, which would like to transform themselves in in sustainable development demonstration laboratories, through the enhancement of their unique Cultural and Natural Heritage potential.
Already 19 case studies, also called Rural Heritage Hubs, are involved in the project. These 19 Rural Heritage Hubs represent 13 good practice examples or Role Models and 6 Replicators, which will implement innovative heritage-led solutions. Together with several multidisciplinary expert institutions, these Rural Heritage Hubs aim to demonstrate that Cultural and Natural Heritage can emerge as a driver for sustainable regeneration and development.
In particular, RURITAGE will:
– Make successful practices and solutions on heritage-led rural regeneration available and replicable;
– Identify the financial resources needed to preserve cultural heritage in rural areas;
– Promote the engagement of rural communities in the decision-making processes;
– Provide roadmaps for the development and long-term sustainability of heritage-led regeneration strategies.
Based on past research and experiences, RURITAGE has identified 6 Systemic Innovation Areas, namely Pilgrimage,Sustainable Local Food production,Art & Festival,Migration,Resilience, and Integrated Landscape Management, which represent the ways in which cultural heritage acts as a driver for regeneration of a rural area and its economic, social and environmental development. Each of these topics is represented in the project by at least 2 Role Models and 1 Replicator.

“Ksar Said: Building Tunisian Young People’s Critical Engagement with Their Heritage”

The 5th of March, the online open access journal “Sustainability” published an article stating the importance of the use of virtual reality for increasing and promoting the value of Tunisian heritage as important cultural expressions of the past.
The article appeared as part of the Special Issue Sustainable Alternate Realities in Digital Heritage and is tiltled: “Ksar Said: Building Tunisian Young People’s Critical Engagement with Their Heritage”.
The paper describes the work undertaken as part of the ‘Digital Documentation of Ksar Said’ Project. This project, funded by the British Council, combined education, history, and heritage for the digital preservation of tangible and intangible aspects of heritage associated with the 19th century Said Palace (Ksar Said) in Tunis. Authors produced an interactive 3D model of Ksar Said and developed learning resources to build Tunisian students’ critical engagement with their heritage through inquiry learning activities within the 3D model.They used a user-centred approach, based on pre-assessment (i.e., co-creation of contents), mid-term evaluation (i.e., feedback on contents and preliminary design of virtual activities), and post-assessment design (i.e., user trial). Their results demonstrate the potential of this novel approach to virtual learning and inform future co-design, evaluation and implementation choices for improving the generative power of three dimensional virtual replication of heritage sites in the cultural heritage sector.

The authors:
Paola Di Giuseppantonio Di Franco: School of Philosophy and Art History and Interdisciplinary Studies Centre, University of Essex; Colchester, CO4 3SQ, UK
Mark Winterbottom: Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge, CB2 8PQ, UK; mw244@cam.ac.uk
Fabrizio Galeazzi Department of Archaeology, University of York, York, YO1 7EP, UK; Interdisciplinary Institute for the
Humanities, University of East Anglia, Norwich, NR1 4DH, UK; fabrizio.galeazzi@york.ac.uk
Mike Gogan: Virtual Experience Company, Malvern, WR13 5EZ, UK; mike@virtualexperience.co.uk

Download the pdf version of the article

Saint Petersburg (Russia), 20-21 June 2019

EVA 2019 Saint Petersburg: Electronic Imaging & the Visual Arts

We invite you to take part in the International Conference EVA 2019 SAINT PETERSBURG: Electronic Imaging & the Visual Arts (http://evaspb.ifmo.ru/en/), which will take place 20 – 21 June 2019 at the ITMO University (Lomonosov Street, bld 9, Saint Petersburg, Russia). Working language is English.

MAIN TOPICS OF THE EVA 2019 Saint Petersburg CONFERENCE:

– Digital Humanities;

– Art&Science;

– AR/VR/MR/XR technologies.

For the participation in the conference you need to register on the website of the Conference (http://evaspb.ifmo.ru/en/registration) and send the summary report (1 p., In English) to the official e-mail address of the Conference (evaspbconf@gmail.com) untill May 1, 2019.

The full texts of the reports included in the conference program, should be sent before May 15, 2019. The results of the conference will be published in the conference proceedings.

Visa Support Information is on the on the website of the Conference (http://evaspb.ifmo.ru/en/visa-support-information)

12th March, Coventry, UK.

The REACH Workshop on participatory approaches for creativity and entrepreneurship

The second REACH project Workshop is getting close!

It is planned for next Tuesday, the 12th of March, in Coventry at the venue of the Institute for Creative Enterprise and it will discuss and explore best practices on participatory approaches in the use and re-use of content and places within the sphere of cultural heritage.

Organized by Coventry University (REACH Project Coordinator), this international event represents a great opportunity for the stakeholders in the cultural heritage sector (creative enterprises, innovative tourism organizations and local development agencies, as well as researchers and students) to investigate the value of creative participatory (re-)use and entrepreneurship in terms of research advancement and social innovation as well as regarding the impact on public and private investment in culture.

The event is organized in three sessions and a final panel discussion.

Two sessions will take place during the morning:
the first will consider what has been done before, in other participatory projects;
the second will go deeper facing in a more practical way the creative re-use and entrepreneurship by showcases.

In the evening, the third session will focus on the participatory approach to journalism via the Digital Meets Culture online magazine.

The day will end with the panel discussion during which the speakers will take questions from the audience.

Further information:

Workshop webpage

Prima rassegna dei prodotti realizzati sui temi del Digital Cultural Heritage dalle Scuole italiane che hanno aderito ad #HackCultura2019.

Per una scuola protagonista della cultura nell’era digitale

Gli incontri dell’11-12 a Matera, del 13 a Trani e del 15-16 a Catanzaro rappresentano un momento di confronto cooperativo promosso dalla Rete DiCultHer che mette al centro la ‘creatività’ dei giovani per affrontare, mediante l’uso consapevole del digitale e con approcci innovativi, la conoscenza, l’accesso partecipato, la gestione e la valorizzazione del Digital Cultural Heritage per realizzare le istanze che hanno portato all’elaborazione e realizzazione del progetto #DiCultHer stesso.

Seguendo il solco tracciato nel 2018 – anno europeo del patrimonio culturale – la programmazione 2018-19 delle attività promosse dalla Scuola a Rete DiCultHer ha rappresentato un ulteriore qualificato momento per favorire la collaborazione con le Istituzioni nazionali ed europee per favorire l’engagement delle fasce giovanili ai vari temi connessi al patrimonio culturale in forma digitale, il Digital Cultural Heritage (DCH) che costituisce ormai la memoria culturale della contemporaneità nell’agire “Con i ragazzi per costruire opportunità” e per garantire contesto e sviluppi attuativi al «diritto di ogni cittadino all’accesso ai saperi e di essere educato alla conoscenza e all’uso responsabile del digitale per la salvaguardia e la valorizzazione del patrimonio culturale e dei luoghi della cultura».

L’11 e 12 Aprile 2019, a Matera, Capitale europea della Cultura del 2019, il 13 a Trani presso il Polo Museale di TRANI – Fondazione SECA, con l’evento dal titolo “Scuola e DiCultHer insieme per la titolarità culturale degli studenti. Patrimonio culturale, sviluppo territoriale, cittadinanza e digitale” e il 15 e 16 a Catanzaro, presso il Teatro Politeama, con l’evento dal titolo “PNSD on the Road – La bellezza salverà il mondo” ci sono sembrati i luoghi e i contesti adeguati per dare voce e attenzione al protagonismo del nostro sistema scolastico e ai nostri ragazzi in particolare che hanno raccolto le sfide sottese alle attività DiCultHer ed in particolare di #HackCultura20192, il primo l’Hackathon per la “titolarità culturale”, la conoscenza e la ‘presa in carico’ del patrimonio culturale nazionale da parte dei giovani, promuovendo la prima rassegna dei prodotti realizzati sui temi del Digital Cultural Heritage dalle Scuole italiane, nella prospettiva a) di renderla permanente nel Mezzogiorno d’Italia quale appuntamento culturale ricorrente per il Paese e per la Scuola in particolare e, b) di avviare il Laboratorio Scuola Matera2019 a supporto della progettazione di iniziative formative, educative e di aggiornamento professionale dei Docenti nel settore del Digital Cultural Heritage, previsto nel Protocollo d’Intesa DiCultHer-USR Basilicata in atto.

Le iniziative sono parte integrante della quarta edizione della Settimana delle Culture Digitali “Antonio Ruberti” (8-14 Aprile 2019) e sono organizzate in collaborazione con gli Uffici Scolastici Regionali di Molise, Calabria e Basilicata, con i quali DiCultHer ha specifici Protocolli d’intesa operativi sui temi dell’Educazione al Patrimonio Culturale, nonché in collaborazione con INDIRE, ICCU-MiBAC, EUROPEANA e Scholas Occurrentes. Per DiCultHer tali attività rappresentano un modo sostanziale per contestualizzare la Convenzione di Faro nell’Era Digitale contemporanea, realizzando attività formative, educative e di ricerca per dotare, in particolare, le nuove generazione della conoscenza non solo delle nuove dimensioni del Patrimonio culturale, ma anche del più vasto universo del nuovo Digital Cultural Heritage. L’obiettivo è quello di realizzare l’integrazione fra saperi umanistici tradizionali e conoscenze di metodi e tecniche computazionali nella strutturazione della nuova Cultura Digitale, attraverso modelli che puntino a creare conoscenze e competenze consapevoli trasversali per la realizzazione di quel digital knowledge design system applicato all’educazione al patrimonio culturale che mette al centro la ‘creatività’ dei giovani per affrontare, mediante l’uso consapevole del digitale e con approcci innovativi, la conoscenza, l’accesso partecipato, la gestione e la valorizzazione del Digital Cultural Heritage delle nascenti Digital Science, Humanities, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics (Digital SHTEAM).

Every weekend this March

The Art+Feminism Wikipedia Edit-a-thon in Southern California Museums

Wikipedia is one of the most popular website and a go-to source for facts online. Anyone can edit Wikipedia, but not everyone does. Studies show that only 16% of Wikipedia editors identify as female; content is skewed by the lack of representation by women and important stories could remain untold.

Art+Feminism is a global do-it-yourself campaign to combat gender bias and improve the coverage of women, intersectional feminism, and the arts on Wikipedia.

For the past six years, DIY campaign Art+Feminism has been holding Wikipedia edit-a-thons aimed at increasing the visibility and representation of women, nonbinary, and transgender people in the arts on the most widely used online reference site.
Starting this weekend and for each weekend in March, as part of its Wikipedia edit-a-thons, Art + Feminism, in collaboration with the online art magazine East of Borneo, will organize events at Southern California museums.

Art + feminism invites you to participate by bringing your laptop or tablet computer to learn how to create and improve Wikipedia articles.

The events organized are:

Sunday, March 3: The Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles

Saturday, March 9: Vincent Price Art Museum

Sunday, March 10: Hammer Museum hosts an edit-a-thon focused on women+Film+Media

Sunday, March 17: LACMA hosts an edit-a-thon focused on Women+Design+Craft

Thursday, March 21: MCA San Diego hosts an edit-a-thon focused on women artists in MCASD’s permanent collection.

Sunday, March 31: California African American Museum edit-a-thon focused on women artists in CAAM’s permanent collection.

For more informations visit the website