22 July 2013

Europeana 1989, a thematic project launched by Europeana

Europeana 1989, the new Europeana's project

Europeana 1989 represents the last thematic project launched by Europeana. Following the path initiated with Europeana 1914 - 1918 project, Europeana 1989 focus on political and social changes in Central and Eastern Europe in the year of th fall of the Iron Curtain.

The truly innovative element in this project is the crowd-sourcing of the virtual exhibition: Europeana, in fact, ask all the people which were involved in this epocal change to share their personal stories and memorabilia from this period, in order to combine them with the official institutional collections and create thus a comprehensive yet depth experience.

The project, launched in Warsaw the last June, aims to create a comprehensive picture of the events which brought to the fall of the Iron Curtain, a picture made of many unseen stories and objects which, thanks to Europeana 1989, can finally find their role in the narrative of the XX century.

As stated by Jill Cousin, Executive Director of Europeana, "History isn’t just about the objects in a museum or the accounts in a book; it’s about real people’s untold stories. Ordinary people make extraordinary history and we must be proud of that and share our stories with whole world".

During the launch event in Warsaw, many people from Poland brought their personal documentation and memorabilia, including the biggest object digitised so far in the project's framework: a Polonez car, produced in Poland during the 80s.

Europeana 1989 is a collaboration between the Polish National Audiovisual Institute, Europeana and Historypin; the HistoryPin platform itself, due to its demonstrated effectiveness, will contribute to the Social Networks Pilot phase of the European project Europeana Creative.

Stefano Sbarbati