Digital meets Culture

led by Matej Bel University, an interactive platform was developed to support tourist promotion, and students were trained to participate in content creation for the website

Creating content for online tourism promotion

Matej Bel University is coordinating the INCULTUM Pilot 3 Mining Treasures of Central Slovakia to improve the touristic and cultural promotion of this region, which has significant cultural and technical heritage related to its mining history.

As part of this work, a new website “Mining Treasures of Central Slovakia” was developed in the Pilot to collect and showcase information and other services to promote the area and its touristic offer: in the context of this action, a training for creating content to be used in this participatory platform was offered to the students of the University, in the period September – December 2022.

Creating the content of an interactive platform is a rather demanding process, which includes: preparation of text obtained from several sources (books, articles, websites, meetings with the community), photography and editing of photos, obtaining information about entrance, opening hours, time required, track length, restrictions, etc. Furthermore, it is necessary to obtain the exact location using Google Maps and the coordinates, which must be verified directly in the field. The content of the interactive platform is created in a participatory manner with the participation of students, representatives of partner organisations, and scientists involved in the project.

For this purpose, we created sharepoint with a clear structure that meets the needs of creating participative content on the platform. The first group of 18 students from Matej Bel University in Banská Bystrica received training on creating content for the participatory platform Mining Treasures of Central Slovakia in September 2022. We divided content creation into three groups corresponding to activities at the platform and their division is based on time requirements for content creation. The first group presents the activities that are the most time-consuming; this includes museums, galleries, churches, calvaries, etc. The second group of activities presents activities with less time consumption; this includes mainly houses and bastions connected to mining heritage. ù

For both groups of activities, it is necessary to go directly to their location and do the field work like visiting heritage sites, collecting data, information, GPS coordinates and pictures. The third group of activities is related to events and creation of basic content for regular events related to mining heritage in Central Slovakia.

In the first stage of field work 18 students were involved and they created original content for a total of 54 activities mainly in area of Banská Bystrica and Špania Dolina. The next stages of field work are planned for 2023 in all mining treasures localities in central Slovakia.

Number of students trained: 18

Number of activities (items) with original content created for the platform: 54

Language: Slovak

The new project launched in January now has its own website to check for all the updates.

EUreka3D website launched today

We are enthusiast to announce the launch of the official website of EUreka3D, a project co-funded by the Digital Europe Programme of the European Union, that aims to support the digital transformation of the cultural heritage sector, by offering capacity building, training and new services to Cultural Heritage institutions, facing the challenge of advancing in the digitization effort, especially in the field of 3D access, storage and sharing.

EUreka3D is a project coordinated by Photoconsortium and involves many other partners, for museums, galleries, libraries, archives and archaeological sites to review and modernise their internal processes from digital capture to end-user access and re-use, and it has the following five main objectives:

To design and assess a range of new services and tools for CH digital transformation.
To provide new contents in Europeana.
To contribute to the capacity building of European CHIs.
To outreach the widest community of CHIs, with particular regard to small institutions.
To guarantee the highest quality of results, in terms of project’s outcomes and in relation to the compliance with Europeana and the future Data Space for Cultural Heritage.

In order to reach these objectives, EUreka3D project will engage a variety of CHIs in a piloting action that will:

Set-up dedicated cloud-based services for the management and preservation of cultural contents in a safe and IP-mindful environment
Generate high-quality 3D digitization of selected items and their related para-/metadata ready to be harvested to Europeana
Perform aggregation of the new contents to the Europeana platform and exemplification of few cases for use and re-use in unique areas such as Education.

EUreka 3D partners:

EUreka 3D website: https://eureka3d.eu/

Find EUreka3D also on Twitter.

Hosted by Uppsala University, the plenary meeting also includes a visit to Uppsala and to Roslagen (Öregrund)

INCULTUM third project meeting

All photos in this blog courtesy of Uppsala University, copyright Mikael Gidhagen.

On 27 and 28 April 2023, the third general assembly of INCULTUM takes place in Sweden, hosted by partner Uppsala University, also leading the INCULTUM Pilot 10 Escape into the Archipelago Landscape. This meeting marks the conclusion of the project’s second year, and it will be dedicated to a global internal review of the project, carefully analysing the progress and challenges in each Work Package, as reviewed with the various activity leaders.

A special focus on Innovation will be dedicated to continue the discussions, exchanges and synergies among the partners and the Pilots in particular, who developed interesting innovation routes in their locations. Guided by the INCULTUM Innovation Manager dr. Vincent Guichard from Bibracte, this session will review the work done so far in fostering promotion of the territories by participative approaches of the local communities and by new tools and actions deployed by the Pilots.

[Show as slideshow]

Other topics in focus are the Impact for the Piloting actions and the extensive work ongoing to translate the experience of the various Pilots into Training Materials targeted to local communities, students, stakeholders and policy makers, collected into the INCULTUM Training Portal.

Agenda of the meeting (PDF)

Close to the conclusion of the project's second year, evidence of innovation in the local strategies for territorial promotion is being collected and shared

Innovation in the INCULTUM Pilots: sharing good practices and success stories

The work done by each of the 10 Pilot cases in the INCULTUM project shows (sometimes big) differences and specifities, nevertheless all the Pilots are aiming at developing new sustainable and collaborative strategies for local promotion of various areas, which also generate an effort in training and supporting actions to local stakeholders and a variety of innovations in rural and marginal territories in Europe.

The coordination for fostering synergies and common strategies in innovation is important to facilitate Pilots’ progress and to identify solutions to common challenges. In this sense, transversality with the INCULTUM innovation manager (dr. Vincent Guichard, Bibracte) is being promoted among partners. A series of innovation factsheets is currently being developed to disseminate the work done by each Pilot for other stakeholders to take inspiration from.

All the information about the work done by the Pilots is now available in the new section “Innovation” available in the project’s website. The section currently includes:

access to the Midterm interim report of the INCULTUM Pilots progress and innovation
summary of the 10 innovation areas identified and deployed by the Pilots
innovation factsheet about the strategies deployed in Bibracte (Pilot 6 “Ancient Paths into the Future”)

More updates are expected with additonal learning and descriptive material developed by each Pilot.

View the Innovation section here: https://incultum.eu/innovation/

On 4-5 April 2023, the Europeana ecosystem met in the twice-a-year gathering to hear and discuss the latest news of digital cultural heritage and Europeana initiatives

EUreka3D presented at Europeana Aggregators Forum

EUreka3D is a project funded by the Digital Europe Programme of the European Union, to support the digital transformation of the cultural heritage sector, by offering capacity building and training, and new services, to Cultural Heritage Institutions facing the challenge of advancing in the digitization effort, especially in 3D.

The project started in January 2023 was presented to colleague institutions, partners and Europeana aggregators, by the Project Coordinator Antonella Fresa, vice president of Photoconsortium, on the occasion of the Spring edition of the Europeana Aggregators Forum, the meeting that gathers all the partners and various stakeholders in the Europeana initiatives.

EUreka3D was specifically part of a session dedicated to 3D in Europeana, moderated by Marie-Véronique Leroi (chair of the Europeana Aggregators Forum Steering Group) and preparing for the key EU conference “Why 3D matters” on 18 April 2023, realized under the Swedish Presidency and fully dedicated to 3D digitization and why it is important for culture.

View and download the presentation (PDF, 351 Kb)

The report presents 15 European digital museum projects by 12 European countries.

A new report published by NEMO, concerning digital learning and education in museums

The Network of European Museum Organisation, NEMO, has presented a new report, “Digital learning and education in museums – Innovative approaches and insights”. The report presents 15 European digital museum projects and offers recommendations for fostering digital engagement, learning and education in the post-pandemic cultural heritage sector.

The 15 projects were submitted by 12 European countries that were developed for remote museum audiences from early 2020 to 2022. It highlights various formats of digital engagement and offers insights and recommendations from museum professionals as well as tech experts, and can be used as an inspiration for professionals looking for new ideas and formats for digital engagement with virtual visitors and reaching new audiences.

The report, published by the NEMO Working Group LEM – The Learning Museum, investigates digital learning in a broad sense and does not solely focus on formal educational projects, or on digital initiatives that are being developed from the beginning with the goal of delivering learning outcomes (formal and non-formal learning). The report covers the following themes:

Educational opportunities associated with the digitisation of museum collections and archives, as well as open access to museum data.
Creative interactions with digitised collection, such as citizen co-curation.
Social media and the expansion of museums into virtual environments and Extended Reality.
Digital communication and chatbots.
Digital games and playful learning.
Sustainable practices to profit from digital innovations.

To learn more about the report, follow this link.

Furthermore, experts will discuss the report and exchange on museums, Extended Reality, the Metaverse and AI Chatbots during a webinar, which will be held on 27 April from 14:00-15:00 CEST. The main author Kristina Barekyan has invited three of the experts interviewed for the NEMO report to discuss the opportunities and challenges of working on the cutting edge of technology, digital cultural heritage and museum education, and the launch webinar of the NEMO report is part of the ALL DIGITAL Weeks and co-hosted by NEMO and Europeana. Although the participation is free, registration is mandatory.

CitizenHeritage multiplier event - Leuven, 19th May 2023

CitizenHeritage: can citizen science contribute to the Cultural Heritage challenges of today?

Hosted by KU Leuven and including hybrid and in-person activities, this multiplier event of the CitizenHeritage project takes place at the Irish College in Leuven. A first part will be dedicated to frontal presentations from CitizenHeritage partners to share with the audience recent research on participatory approaches in cultural heritage and stories from the project’s journey so far.

A Workshop for students and other participants will follow in the afternoon.

Statue of Rembrecht Dodoens, famous physician and botanist in the 16th century, in the botanic garden of Leuven. Botanical gardens are traditional places to share scientific insights with the general public. Ph. by Fred Truyen.

Agenda and registration link: https://www.citizenheritage.eu/multiplier-events/multiplier-event-leuven-19-may-2023/

Schedule 19th May 2023:

10.00-12.00 Conference
13.00-17.00 Workshop
17.00-18.30 Transnational project meeting (Citizen Heritage partners only)

The training course is open to anyone interested and is done in collaboration with the experts of “OFFICINA STUDI MEDIEVALI” (Office of Medieval Studies).

Training activities about Islamic heritage in Sicily – INCULTUM Pilot

The INCULTUM Pilot set in Sicily is coordinated by the GAL Elimos, and is organizing a trainign action dedicated to share and enhance the islamic heritage in the territory of Mounts of Trapani.

The Sicilian GAL (Local Action Group) launched a new training course open to anyone interested, about the “Islamic itinerary”. The aim is to increase and share knowledge about the Islamic culture and its importance in Sicily. The training course will be done in collaboration with the experts of “OFFICINA STUDI MEDIEVALI” (Office of Medieval Studies).

The acquired knowledge will be the perfect base for future collaboration with local stakeholders and for more vocational trainings of tourism guides that are under development in the INCULTUM Pilot, with the specific aim of enhancing and promoting an “Islamic Itinerary” that unfolds across 3 municipalities in the area.

Volterra it is the city chosen as main case of the strategic planning axis for WP5. The field work includes interviews, questionnaire and public event with local community

Volterra: the survey on the territory involving stakeholders and citizens has started

Volterra city center – Picture courtesy of Promoter Srl

The case study of Volterra is part of the thematic Axis of Strategic Cultural Planning of WP5 Experimental Demonstration in the UNCHARTED project. The field work aims to reflect, verify and demonstrate how the social values of culture, identified during the UNCHARTED project, have an impact on the strategic planning of cultural policies of city. The worklan started with meeting between project’s experts and the representatives of the Municipality continues now with focused interviews to a range stakeholders representing various economic, social and cultural sector of the city.

Since 2020 the municipal administration of Volterra has undertaken a strategy of cultural policies that led to its appointment in 2022 by the Tuscany Region as “First Tuscan City of Culture“. A rich program of events followed during the whole year covering many different artistic and cultural dimensions. The aim of the study of UNCHARTED is to understand how these policies have influenced the territory from a social, economic and civic point of view.

To achieve this goal, Promoter Srl, as a partner of the UNCHARTED project, is conducting a survey targeting stakeholders from different sectors, listening at the territory and involving actively the local community that is in this way called to contribute with their own ideas, reflections and ideas.

In March 2023, the participatory activities have started on the territory of Volterra, planned together with the municipal administration, under a coordinated co-creation approach. The work team is engaged during the coming months in a series of interviews with a list of multi-stakeholders, with the aim to cover a significant cross-section of the territory so as to reconstruct a first articulated picture of the impacts of the public cultural strategic planning on the life of the local communities. The actors involved in this phase are composed mainly of protagonists of the cultural and artistic sector (directors of museums, curators of art galleries, theatre directors, archaeologists, designers, artists, etc.) but also by representatives of the economic and social sector (commerce, school, tourism, etc.).

The activities will continue in the coming months with an online questionnaire addressed to all citizens and with the organization of a public event to be held in the autumn and which will aim to present the results of the research.

Stay tuned to follow our work steps.

welcomed by colleagues of Eachtra, the team of partner Promoter visited churches and graves that tell stories of local communities

Travelling to Ireland to meet the INCULTUM pilot dedicated to historic graveyards

In March 2023, INCULTUM partners Promoter and Eachtra met to discuss about the work ongoing in the Pilot 9 Historic Graves of Ireland.

This online project capitalized on the phenomenon of Irish diaspora, supporting Irish descents in maintaining or rediscovering their connection with Irish cultural identity and heritage. The project put together a worldwide community of more than 15,000 users, collaborating in generating a nationwide genealogical dataset. The initiative started in 2010, as a community-focused participatory grassroots heritage project, where local community groups living in Ireland are trained in low-cost high-tech field survey of historic graveyards and recording of their own oral histories.

In almost a decade, historicgraves.com published online more than 800 cemeteries, recording the location of approximatively 100,000 graves and collaboratively transcribing the details of 196,808 people, and counting. Community co-production happens within a freely available online platform, created for the transcription of memorial epitaphs. Training workshops are offered to local communities interested in contributing to surveying and transcribing historic graveyards.

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In the framework of INCULTUM, work is done to augment the touristic potential of such community heritage “micro-projects”, especially by improving communications among communities and also among those communities and the diaspora population to whom they supply heritage data and stories.

This entailed modification of the web platform as well as running a series of local and virtual workshops, to learn from the participating community groups, fostering the combination of new groups and older more experienced groups in order to spark new exchanges.