Europeana’s stand was inaugurated by Stefan Buontempo, Parliamentary Secretary for Research, Innovation, Youth and Sport at the official launch of the National Book Fest, on Tuesday, 12th November.

Dr Buontempo awarded prizes to the winners of Europeana’s nation-wide cultural competition to choose an image from the millions of items on Europeana.eu to represent Malta’s heritage . He also presented prizes to the Form 1 and 2 students from across Malta who wrote the top ten stories for Europeana’s storywriting competition. The ten stories have been published in Europeana’s new ebook entitled ‘Europeana: Stories from Malta’ which is exhibited at Europeana’s stand at the National Book Fest from 13th to 17th November. This can be also downloaded from http://acrosslimits.com/europeana-ebook

Europeana is Europe’s digital museum, library, gallery and archive and together with its Maltese partner, AcrossLimits, it recently launched three national competitions on both the ‘Malta in Europe – Europeana’ Facebook page and in schools as part of a nation-wide campaign to introduce Malta to the millions of European cultural treasures that can be found on Europeana.eu, including books and manuscripts, photos and paintings, television and film, sculpture and crafts, diaries and maps.

Dr Buontempo inaugurated the creation of Europeana’s ‘big canvas’ at the stand by signing and sticking one of the twelve stars of the European flag on the canvas. The canvas depicts the image chosen to represent Malta’s heritage from Europeana.eu. The winning image, nominated by Josephine Spiteri and voted for by the Maltese public, is an ancient map of Malta showing where St. Paul was shipwrecked. The people of Malta are invited to help recreate this winning image, on a 5m x 2m canvas on Europeana’s stand during the National Book Fest. The finished canvas will be displayed at St. James Cavalier, Centre for Creativity from the 9th December to the 22nd December.

Diane Chircop, who was selected randomly from the hundreds of people who voted for their favourite item already nominated by Maltese citizens, was also awarded a prize. The third winner of the evening was student Alexander Cortis who wrote the overall winning contribution for Europeana’s ebook as chosen by Maltese actor, Gowdin Scerri. His story, ‘The European City of Valletta’ is included in ‘Europeana: Stories from Malta’, together with the other top nine stories. Dr Buontempo presented the writers of these stories with a consolation prize, courtesy of Merlin Library.

‘Europeana: Stories from Malta’ marks the students’ participation in one of Europeana’s national cultural competitions. Each of the ten stories in the eBook describes a piece of Maltese cultural heritage that the students found on Europeana.eu and that they think represents them as Maltese-European citizens. The public can discover all of the stories by using their smartphones with Europeana stand’s special interactive panels. The stand is situated in area L3 at the National Book Fest at the Mediterranean Conference Centre in Valletta.

Speaking about Europeana’s involvement in the National Book Fest Dr Buontempo said: “Europeana is one of those organisations which took the opportunity to open new frontiers in their sector. Through their initiative, Malta, its culture and heritage are being promoted throughout the world. It is another opportunity to entice foreigners coming to our shores.”

Joe Debattista, Segretary of the National Book Council said: “It is a wonderful experience to have Europeana participating with us, with Malta being part of Europe. We hope to have Europeana with us on all occasions.”

By visiting Europeana.eu on your PC, tablet or mobile you can find more than 29 million items from 2,300 leading galleries, libraries, archives and museums. Books and manuscripts, photos and paintings, television and film, sculpture and crafts, diaries and maps, sheet music and recordings can all be discovered.

The Europeana website and the ‘Malta in Europe – Europeana’ Facebook page are accessible at www.europeana.eu and www.facebook.com/EuropeanaMalta, respectively. You are also invited to follow Europeana on Twitter@europeanaeu and #AllezCulture.