IMMA Goes Digital!

The Foundation for the Museum of the Macedonian Struggle and the Modern History of Macedonia (IMMA) enters the digital era with the completion of the project “Digital infrastructure and actions to support the objectives of the Foundation for the Museum of the Macedonian Struggle and the Modern History of Macedonia”, which was presented to the public on Saturday 2 December 2023.

The event was addressed by Mrs. Athina Pavlidou, Philologist-Museologist/Cultural Administrator, PhD in Museology, University of the Aegean, Director of IMMA, who referred to the multidimensional work of digital transformation and the new strong digital identity of IMMA that follows the guidelines of the new ICOM definition of a museum and responds to the needs of the 21st century visitor. This was followed by the speech of Mrs. Stavroula Mavrogeni, Professor of the University of Macedonia, Director of the Centre for Research on Macedonian History and Documentation (KEMIT), who presented the work of KEMIT researchers in completing the documentation of the entire collection and the rich archival material and stressed the importance of the integration of IMMA’s digitized cultural heritage in the digital repositories of the National Documentation Centre and Europeana.

Mr. Vangelis Nikolaou, Project Manager of the NextCom Group, spoke about all the individual tasks, who referred to the processes of digitization, photography, 3D imaging and documentation of the selected exhibits and archival material, as well as to the design of the storytelling productions and the 360° virtual tour. Lina Babatzia, Documentation and Collection Management System Manager of NextCom Group, presented the open source software Collective Access, which was configured to host the digitized exhibits and archival material of IMMA. Finally, Mr. Kostas Karachalios, Digital Applications Implementation Manager of Tool Company, analyzed the development of IMMA’s new digital identity and presented to the audience the new website, specially designed to promote and highlight the history and work of IMMA, as well as the new interactive digital applications, such as the digital tour guide, the digital educational application, the digital map and the timeline.

The event was attended by the Secretary General of the Parliamentary Group of the New Democracy, MP for Thessaloniki, Mr. Stavros Kalafatis, the Mayor of Thessaloniki, Mr. Konstantinos Zervas, the Metropolitan of Thessaloniki, Mr. Philotheus, the President of the IMMA, Mr. Nikolaos Margaropoulos, the President of the Association “Friends of the Museum of the Macedonian Struggle”, Mr. Dimitrios Kostopoulos, university professors and friends of the IMMA.

The project was implemented in cooperation with the NextCom Group, through the Operational Programme “Competitiveness, Entrepreneurship & Innovation” (EPANEK) 2014-2020, co-financed by Greece and the European Union (European Regional Development Fund – European Regional Development Fund – ERDF).