Digital meets Culture

the concluding event of this project, focused on local communities and identity, was held on 16 September 2022 in Girona

INCULTUM at WEAVE Final Conference

WEAVE – Widen European Access to cultural communities Via Europeana is a Europeana project funded by the CEF Programme of the EU and is part of the INCULTUM network. Focus of the project is on enhancing European access to intangible cultural heritage and the heritage of minority and local cultural communities.

In Girona on 16 September 2022 was organized the final conference “Weaving digital culture: tangible and intangible heritage, cultural communities and the digital transformation”. The overarching theme of the conference was exploring connections between tangible and intangible heritage, cultural communities and the process of digital transformation of cultural heritage organisations.

Antonella Fresa, director at Promoter and leader for dissemination in INCULTUM, participated in the event with a wide keynote speech, entitled “Cultural values, identities, participation and local communities”, where she also presented the INCULTUM project and its work to engage communities with their territories and local heritage. This is in facts an example of communities having a active role and a stake with their territorial and heritage promotion, which will have a positive impact on social ties and local ideentity.

Conference details, full video of the event and presentations are available at https://weave-culture.eu/conference/

fostered by INCULTUM coordinator the University of Granada, the agreement has formalised the recognition by public institutions of the importance of traditional and historical irrigation in Cáñar

INCULTUM Pilot: collaboration agreements established in Altiplano de Granada

text and images courtesy of Elena Correa Jiménez (University of Granada).

On 6 September, the first signing took place of the first collaboration agreements between Cáñar Irrigation Communities and Cáñar Town Councils that the INCULTUM Pilot coordinated by the University of Granada is carrying out.

The agreement has formalised the recognition by public institutions of the importance of traditional and historical irrigation in the municipality, not only for providing drinking or irrigation water to those living in the municipality and in other municipalities downstream, but also for its environmental, cultural or economic functions: aquifer recharge, generation of biodiversity, climate regulation, generation of cultural landscapes… (all these issues are summarised in Arguments in defence of traditional and historical irrigation system).

These agreements are the way to ensure a positive impact for irrigation communities through the recognition of the ecosystem services they provide. It is a possibility to diversify the supply and economic activity of farmers and livestock farmers through multifunctionality. The recognition of this multifunctionality and of the ecosystem services is fundamental, and is the main contribution.

The proposal for the trails is a consequence of this recognition, as they are areas of high cultural, environmental and landscape value. The fee-for-service agreements are a tool to contribute to the maintenance of the historical irrigation systems and, in particular, of the paths associated with the irrigation ditches.

Learn more about INCULTUM Pilot 1 – Altiplano de Granada

INVENT Report on the diverse notions of culture

What does culture mean to Europeans?

The new report of INVENT aims to answer this question by gathering data and analysis to trace the multiplicity of understandings of culture within and across Europe.

The report consists of 3 main parts.

It begins with a brief discussion on the different conceptions of culture, the current “cultural abundance” and on how the manifold societal megatrends in Europe and the western world since the latter part of the 20th century have affected both the cultural environment in which we live, and the conceptual “baggage” associated with the term culture.

Then, two empirical parts follows based on wide-ranging and nationally representative survey datasets collected by INVENT in 2021 in its nine countries: Croatia, Denmark, Finland, France, the Netherlands, Serbia, Spain, Switzerland, and the UK.

The results show that the classical distinction between the notions of narrow (“culture as arts”) and broad (“culture as ways of life”) culture continues to persist in a relevant way, but, at the same time, they show that the distinction does not fully capturehow people in Europe today understand the concept.

The report can be downloaded at https://inventculture.eu/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/INVENT-REPORT-WhatdoesculturemeantoEuropeans.pdf

More information about INVENT, sister project of UNCHARTED, selected and funded under the same call TR-08-2019 “The social value of culture and the impact of cultural policies in Europe” of Horizon 2020, are available at https://inventculture.eu/.

keynotes and presentations, a digital exhibition and a workshop about photogrammetry composed the final event of the EU funded project dedicated to highlight tangible and intangible heritage of local communities

WEAVE final conference, recordings and presentations available

Hosted by CRDI in Girona at Centre Cultural La Mercè, the WEAVE project organized on 16th September 2022 its final conference, which explored the connections between tangible and intangible heritage, cultural communities and the process of digital transformation of cultural heritage organisations. The day was preceded by the plenary meeting of WEAVE consortium, held at the premises of Arxiu Municipal on 15th September.

[Show as slideshow]

CONFERENCE AGENDA with presentations

Joan Boadas (CRDI Director), George Ioannidis (IN2/WEAVE coordinator): Welcome messages

Jolan Wuyts (Collection Editor at Europeana): ‘Unheard voices: learning to tell more diverse stories in the cultural heritage sector’ – PDF

Antonella Fresa (Director at Promoter): Cultural values, identities, participation and local communities – PDF

Fred Truyen: Connecting communities and tangible-intangible heritage and capacity building – PDF

Matevž Straus: Creation and reuse of 3D models of monuments and tangible cultural heritage – PDF

Presenting the WEAVE toolbox:

George Ioannidis: WEAVEx – PDF
Matevž Straus: 3D assets manager – PDF
Nuno Correia: MotionNotes – PDF
Orfeas Menis-Mastromichalakis: Metadata Enrichment tools – PDF

Valentina Bachi and WEAVE content providers: Presenting the heritage collections digitized and published by WEAVE in Europeana – PDF

John Balean: Process and Discovery: using legacy taxonomy structures for locating intangible heritage imagery – PDF

Sofie Taes: Europeana editorials and virtual exhibition – PDF

Marc Hernandez, David Iglésias: The use of photogrammetry for 3D digitisation of a daguerreotype collection – PDF (coming soon)

The whole conference was recorded:

After the talks, for the participants in Girona a networking lunch and a digital exhibition gave the floor to all participants to engage in a lively discussion following the inspiration drawn from the programme.

To conclude the event, an interesting workshop about photogrammetry digitization took place to illustrate modern techniques to create accurad te and high quality 3D models of cultural heritage objects, with a particular focus on heritage photography.

September-December 2022

The travelling MEMEX Exhibition is coming!

News from UNCHARTED community! MEMEX, the three-year H2020 project, aims to promote social cohesion through collaborative, heritage-related tools that provide inclusive access to tangible and intangible cultural heritage and, at the same time, facilitate encounters, discussions and interactions between communities at risk of social exclusion.

In the next few days it will kick off the Traveling MEMEX Exhibition which from September will continue until December.
The event will be an opportunity to discover the stories created by the inhabitants through the MEMEX project, the project methodology, the prototype app, the pilot projects and the policy recommendations.

In Lisbon, Barcelona and Paris participants were engaged by the MEMEX project’s partners in a digital storytelling journey based on a dedicated methodology and a co-designed app aiming to reinforce inclusion and cultural participation: visiting local heritage through guided tours, reflecting on these places and expressions, identifying the topics and writing their stories, and finally, co-creating audio-visual stories, emphasizing the active role of the participants in re-interpreting existing heritage and in co-creating plural meanings of it.

The MEMEX exhibition will present some of the stories as well as the social and technological development of the project.
The exhibition entrance is free in all locations and open to all.

The itinerary of this narrative journey includes:

Lisbon – 19/09/2022 – 29/09/2022 – Pharmacy Museum – R. Mal. Saldanha 1, 1249-069 Lisboa, Portugal – Public opening on September 19th (5pm GMT +1)
Paris – 05/10/2022 – 13/10/2022 – Rosa Lab – 20 voie EU/19, Paris 75019 – Public opening on October 5th (5 pm CET)
Genoa from 20/10/2022 – 01/11/2022- Festival Della Scienza – Piazza Giacomo Matteotti, 9, 16123 Genova GE, Italy
Barcelona – 09/11/2022 – 23/12/2022 – Loop Festival – C/ de València, 302, 08009 Barcelona, Spain – Public opening on November 9th (7pm GMT+2)

More information on the exhibition is available here.

News from UNCHARTED community

NEMO statement on the impact of the energy crisis on museums in Europe

NEMO, the Network of European Museum Associations, after observing the exceptional increase of costs for electricity and gas and its impact on museums in recent months, has published a statement calling on policy makers to support museums to cope with the energy crisis and keep open.

With the exceptional increase of costs for electricity and gas, some museums’ energy bills are likely to increase by 400% and there are already reports of museums having to close due to the energy crisis. NEMO fears that more will follow unless appropriate measures are taken.

NEMO also writes that cultural spaces and offers are important for social cohesion and personal well-being during times of crisis. The closure and/or reduction of services of museums has a minimal impact in terms of energy savings but does have a significant impact on the cultural and social fabric of Europe in this challenging time.

Read the statement here

French food as cultural heritage and the role of locality

WEAVE blogpost: A taste of terroir?

img: Fishermen in Lorient (France) by J. Hersleven, Jacques – Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage, Belgium – CC BY-NC-SA.

The cultural connection between heritage and food has gradually gained visibility over the last decades.

Read the blog published by the WEAVE project editorial team in Europeana to discover the role of food as #CulturalHeritage in France
HERE

This blog is part of WEAVE – Widen European Access to cultural communities Via Europeana: a project funded by the European Commission under the Connecting Europe Facilities (CEF) aimed at developing a framework to link the tangible and intangible heritage of cultural communities.

How to safeguard transient, traditional and untouchable culture

WEAVE blogpost: Caring for intangible cultural heritage

img: Gegants i capgrossos, CRDI/Ajuntament de Girona, PD.

Intangible cultural heritage is a substantial part of what makes up our histories and identities, understood to be practices, ideas, insights and experiences.

Read the blog published by the WEAVE project editorial team in Europeana, to learn how to safeguard untouchable culture
HERE

From 19 to 22 August 2022 each part of the island of Sikinos transformed into a field of play, discovery and creation, where the audience became from a spectator to a participant and co-creator.

Little Islands Festival 2022 aftermovie

The Festival that connects the Aegean landscape and nature with Audiovisual Arts, Little Islands Festival (LIF) is dedicated to all artistic communities experimenting with hybrid artistic practices at the boundaries of the performing and digital arts.

The 4th edition of Little Islands Festival took place in summer 2022 under the theme of “Communality”, and explored the notion of community and opened a dialogue on its meaning and scope. Our driving force is the Aegean Sea as an element of unity and communication that has shaped a collective life culture, moving between self-sufficiency, resilience and assertion, interaction and coexistence. The festival hosted the works of 100 artists from Greece and abroad, presented installations, screenings, music, alternative tours, workshops, talks, site-specific projects and audiovisual performances.

From 19 to 22 August 2022 each part of the island of Sikinos transformed into a field of play, discovery and creation, where the audience became from a spectator to a participant and co-creator. We experiment with public open art that interacts with the regions of the world, making events that transform into common places, creating performances, telling stories, connecting the shared memory of space with the new reality of the digital world. Seeking the unexpected, the artistic experience that stimulates the emotion and sensory bodies, the “here” and “now” co-presence of people.

the important Digital Humanities Congress took place in Hybrid format in September 2022

CitizenHeritage presented at DHC 2022 in Sheffield

The Digital Humanities Congress is a conference hosted by the DHI at the University of Sheffield every two years. Its purpose is to promote the sharing of knowledge, ideas and techniques within the digital humanities. The fifth Congress was held in Sheffield from 8th – 10th September 2022. The programme included three keynote speakers and 44 papers, as well as plenary presentations.

The talk delivered by CitizenHeritage coordinator prof. Fred Truyen (KU Leuven) was entitled CitizenHeritage: Crowdsourcing, Digital Curation and Citizen Science with European Photographic Collections, and discussed the results of work on Photographic Heritage collections in a series of EU-funded research projects among which “Kaleidoscope: the 1950s in Europe” and “Europeana XX: Century of Change”, where digitised collections were contributed to Europeana, and both AI as well as crowdsourcing technologies were used to enrich metadata. In the context of the project CitizenHeritage, the talk indicated a roadmap in how this can lead to genuine citizen science.

In pursuit of the many “Visual identities of Europe” in the 20th century, editorials and hybrid virtual/physical exhibitions were curated based on aggregated collections from a wide variety of heritage institutions, allowing to explore new relations between and objects, representations and narratives. The presentation explained how data aggregation, AI-supported data improvement and crowdsourced data validation contribute to innovative heritage research, involving citizens and stakeholder communities.

Visit conference site: https://www.dhi.ac.uk/dhc/2022/

Download the presentation by prof. Fred Truyen, PDF 9 Mb