Centre for Technology, Restoration and Art Enhancement

Promotion and enhancement of artistic and cultural heritage

The Promotion and Enhancement of Artistic and Cultural Heritage area includes the action lines:

b1) Didactics, Technology and Communication and b2) Design and Innovation.

b1) Didactics, Technology and Communication – this line of research aims at educating, raising awareness and disseminating cultural and artistic heritage and its protection at various levels. As far as didactics is concerned, the aim is to achieve a symbiosis between heritage, heritage interpretation and tourism under an ethos of sustainability. Therefore, the goal is to provide active and integrated learning through the interpretation of cultural heritage manifestations of high scientific, didactic, heritage and tourist value. From an recreational perspective, cultural heritage management will shed further light on social and cultural dynamics of the modern world. Therefore interaction between learning promotion contexts by exploring didactic, technological and communicational connections will be promoted. These methodologies and strategies include e-learning, mobile-learning, learning objects, digital libraries and repositories, as well as gamification. Immersive environments, augmented reality, virtual reality, information systems, multimedia and hypermedia systems, and apps are also dealt with. This line of action gathers researchers in the field of cultural tourism, documentary film-making, design and computing.

b2) Design and Innovation – includes a creative component. Thus, the aesthetic, practical and symbolic functions of the products or projects are considered, while engaging with society in a sustainable, inclusive and innovative manner. This line of research deals with technological, social, economic and cultural aspects, along with shape and function, both in terms of communication and product, directing its action towards society’s material and cultural needs. It also considers artistic and cultural forms of expression and manifestations, both material and immaterial, to preserve the legacy in those manifestations as well as to decode and re-interpret heritage in the light of current theories, conceptions and languages.