From July 12 to July 18, 2021 the Balkan Heritage team – Ivan Vasilev and Angela Pencheva attended a study program in Thessaloniki, Greece as part of the project “Immersive Storytelling Driven Cooperation for Cultural Heritage Dissemination in Western Balkans.” The goal of the program is to help cultural institutions learn to use digital technologies in order to promote cultural heritage and reach a wider audience. The Balkan Heritage Foundation will develop three field schools – in National Institution Stobi, North Macedonia, Archaeological Park Emona, Slovenia and Archaeological Park Viminacium, Serbia in 2022 as part of their commitment to the project.

The training in Thessaloniki was the second in the series of seminars (read about the first one in Stobi, North Macedonia here) and was attended by representatives of all partnering countries and their respective institutions. During the brainstorming sessions the attendees started creating a development and cooperation model for use of immersive technology on cultural heritage sites in the Western Balkans.

The event program included topics such as “Cultural Sector creates new paths for audience engagement in the Digital Post- Covid world”, “Social Robots and application in Cultural Heritage”, “Creation of multimedia items for promoting cultural and heritage aspects of modern societies”. A field trip to the Archaeological Park of DION at mount Olympus, the Byzantine Museum and the Digital Transformation and Digital Skills Center in Thessaloniki were also part of the seminar.

The next training session will be in Ljubljana, Slovenia in September 2021.