Georgia Evans
Senior Editorial Officer , Europeana Foundation
From 1 - 31 October 2019, GIF-makers, cultural heritage enthusiasts and fans of all things digital can take part in the sixth annual GIF IT UP competition.
GIF IT UP challenges people to reuse digitised cultural heritage material to produce unique artworks of their own and share them online. This year, the competition is run by Europeana in close collaboration with the Digital Public Library of America, Trove and DigitalNZ.
Using the copyright-free paintings, photography and texts digitised in these online collections, throughout October participants can create, submit, and share striking new GIFs to fill the internet with cultural heritage. The competition promotes the use of public domain and openly licensed content, and helps audiences learn about image licensing in an interactive and fun way. GIF IT UP is supported by GIPHY, the world's largest library of animated GIFs.
2018 prize-winning entry from Guillaume Gaudart (Paris, France). Source material: Kvinna blåser i näverlur, Stiftelsen Nordiska museet via Europeana. GIF via GIPHY.
The 2019 competition has a special focus on getting young people involved, with a prize category for schools to encourage students aged 8 - 18 to take part. This will introduce a new generation to online cultural heritage treasures, promote awareness of copyright, and encourage children to learn new digital skills. Simple online tutorials are available on the GIF IT UP website to get all first-time GIF makers started.
And as part of Europeana’s season for 2019, Europe at Work, there is an additional special prize category for GIFs inspired by industrial heritage material. The new industrial heritage collection on Europeana brings together around half a million cultural heritage objects from across Europe, offering great inspiration for people looking to make GIFs from industrial and labour-related heritage material!
Entries can be submitted until 31 October through the GIF IT UP website. The jury, made up of representatives from GIPHY, DailyArt and the Teaching with Europeana project, will award prizes sponsored by Europeana and GIPHY. The winners will be announced in November on the GIF IT UP website and online. Follow all the fun and view the winning entries with the hashtag #GIFITUP2019!
2018 Grand Prize winning entry from Kristen and Jeff Gill (Los Angeles, USA). Source material: houtgravure, Rozendaal, W.J., CODA Museum via Europeana. GIF via GIPHY.
GIF IT UP started in 2014 as an initiative of the Digital Public Library of America (DPLA) and DigitalNZ and has been inspiring people to get creative with cultural heritage ever since. In 2018, 250 people entered the competition with the winning GIF created by Kristen and Jeff Gill (Los Angeles, USA).
And the competition is building a return following. Alexander King, who won the ‘First-time GIF-maker’ category in 2017, also participated in the competition in 2018. He said, ‘This was my second year participating in @Europeanaeu's awesome gif making contest #GIFItUp2018, where you use public domain resources to make a fun gif!’ (via Twitter).
Georgia Evans - Europeana Foundation
Europeana is Europe’s platform for digital cultural heritage with a mission to ‘transform the world with culture’. Europeana Collections is Europe’s digital library, museum, gallery and archive. From books, photos and paintings to television broadcasts and 3D objects, Europeana Collections provides online access to a vast store of cultural heritage material from across Europe for everyone to find, use and share: for research, for learning, for creating new things. (@EuropeanaEU). The Europeana Foundation is the organisation tasked by the European Commission with developing a digital cultural heritage platform for Europe.
Europeana DSI is co-financed by the European Union’s Connecting Europe Facility.