European Programme Horizon 2020

Virtual museums and social platform on European digital heritage

On 14 October 2015, the call for proposals CULT-COOP-08-2016 “Virtual museums and social platform on European digital heritage, memory, identity and cultural interaction” has been published by the European Commission in the framework of the Horizon2020 Programme.  

ICT changes the way cultural digital resources are created, disseminated, preserved and (re)used. It empowers different types of users to engage with cultural digital resources, for example through web discovery interfaces representing a wealth of information from collections (archives, scientific collection, museums, art galleries, visual arts etc.) enabling their re-use and re-purposing according to users' needs and inputs. The Virtual Museum (VM) is not a real museum transposed to the web, nor an archive or a database of virtual digital assets but a provider of information on top of being an exhibition room. VM provide opportunities for people to access digital content before, during and after a visit in a range of digital ‘encounters’. Virtual museum is technologically demanding especially in terms of virtual and augmented reality and storytelling authoring tools which must covers various types of digital creations including virtual reality and 3D experiences, located online, in museums or on heritage sites. The challenge will be to give further emphasis on improving access, establishing meaningful narratives for collections and displays and story-led interpretation by the development of VM. It will also address the fundamental issues that are required to make this happen e.g. image rights, licensing and the ability of museums to support new ICT technology.

The emergence of new social paradigms in the area of European Heritage induce the creation of specific social platforms that will encourage an active participation of a large number of stakeholders aiming at a better understanding of the European cultural heritage. Moreover it should facilitate and support a better understanding of the past to better build our future. The challenge is to support the multidisciplinary awareness needed for providing a comprehensive framework for the accessibility, preservation, participatory and sustainable management of cultural resources and assets, based on a holistic, social understanding of European culture and cultural heritage. This challenge will contribute to the debate over these issues and opportunities by facilitating an open dialogue on how technological changes, new business models and scientific progress impact and accelerate developments, including social change, determine policy changes, and support new investments (both private and public) involving diverse actors with different stakes and agendas. Researching digital cultural heritage is of key, long-term importance to Europe in order to form a robust knowledge base on how cultural heritage may develop in the 21st century. This will enable creative and innovative partnerships between museums, creative industries and public-domain areas such as education with transfer value to other socio-cultural areas and will advance strategies for heritage institutions, including museums, to harness transversal citizen resources and thus enhance their benefit to wider society.

The aim of the current CULT-COOP-08-2016 “Virtual museums and social platform on European digital heritage, memory, identity and cultural interaction” call for proposals, published by the European Commission in the framework of the Horizon2020 Programme, is to create a personalized, immersive, interactive ways to enhance our understanding of the world around us. European cultural heritage is being radically transformed with the wide adoption of digital media used for engagement, participation and inclusion. Researching these transformations encompass the engagements of citizens in their own formation of heritage and the options for heritage institutions to capitalize on the new forms of communication and interaction.

The priority of the current CULT-COOP-08-2016 “Virtual museums and social platform on European digital heritage, memory, identity and cultural interaction” call for proposals, published by the European Commission in the framework of the Horizon2020 Programme, is the development of highly innovative technologies, methods and ICT tools to significantly improve the ‘digital encounter’ including quality of images, sonic narratives, the display and interactivity with digital objects. Besides, actions should research and create new ways of personalized storytelling, interactivity and adaptive guidance, bridging the physical and the digital world. The technology resulting from the research should be validated in real life environments. During test and validation phases, due attention has to be paid to scalability, portability, transmedia and interoperability of the technologies proposed and the support needed when implemented. Furthermore, social media tools should be integrated into the VM platform in order to facilitate exchange of information among users.

The expected impact of the current CULT-COOP-08-2016 “Virtual museums and social platform on European digital heritage, memory, identity and cultural interaction” call for proposals, published by the European Commission in the framework of the Horizon2020 Programme, is to make virtual museums and social platforms accessible for everyone, breaking the restrictions of geography and time. Researchers and scholars will benefit from the new possibilities to shape, access and study European Culture. Synergies between virtual and traditional museums and cultural institutions will support the economic growth of the sector as measurable impacts will be achieved beyond the beneficiaries of the funded projects.

 

The budget earmarked for the co-financing of the current CULT-COOP-08-2016 “Virtual museums and social platform on European digital heritage, memory, identity and cultural interaction” call for proposals, published by the European Commission in the framework of the Horizon2020 Programme, is EUR 2.5 million. This does not preclude submission and selection of proposals requesting other amounts.

The deadline for submitting proposals in the framework of the current CULT-COOP-08-2016 “Virtual museums and social platform on European digital heritage, memory, identity and cultural interaction” call for proposals, published by the European Commission in the framework of the Horizon2020 Programme, is 4 February 2016.  

Further information on the current call for proposals is available on the Horizon2020’ web site at: http://ec.europa.eu/research/participants/portal/desktop/en/opportunities/h2020/topics/3089-cult-coop-08-2016.html.