Projects
Since 2012, SearchCulture.gr has been designed, developed and operated by the National Documentation Centre (EKT), drawing on its in-house scientific and technical expertise and specialised staff. Its development and continuous evolution are jointly funded through EKT’s own resources and nationally and European-funded projects.
Funding: European Union (EuroHPC Joint Undertaking) and the Hellenic Ministry of Digital Governance.
The ongoing development and expansion of SearchCulture.gr are currently supported by PHAROS (“Pharos: The Greek AI Factory for Accelerating AI Innovation”), running from April 2025 to March 2028. PHAROS aims to establish a national AI Factory, leveraging the capabilities of the DAEDALUS supercomputer. The project seeks to build a trustworthy and sustainable AI ecosystem, initially focusing on three key domains: Health, Culture and Language, and Sustainability. It is coordinated by GRNET S.A., bringing together leading research and academic institutions in Greece.
Within PHAROS, EKT contributes to the establishment of the Greek hub of the Common European Data Space for Cultural Heritage (DS4CH), with SearchCulture.gr serving as a core infrastructure. As Greece’s National Aggregator of Digital Cultural Content and an accredited national aggregator for Europeana, SearchCulture.gr plays a central role in the aggregation, documentation and semantic linking of Greece’s digital cultural heritage.
EKT’s activities focus on the integration and enrichment of digital cultural collections, as well as the development of infrastructures for the semantic organisation and linking of their metadata, drawing on controlled vocabularies and structured knowledge about persons, places, subjects and historical events. A notable outcome of these activities is the new Historical Events Infrastructure of SearchCulture.gr, which enables the linking of digital cultural items to historical events and the exploration of related cultural heritage content. The aim is to improve metadata quality, interoperability and semantic consistency, enhancing both cultural content discovery and its potential use by Artificial Intelligence applications. In parallel, EKT contributes to the development and evaluation of innovative AI services for searching and exploring digital cultural content.
Enrich and promote traditional and contemporary crafts
Funding: European Union – Connecting Europe Facility (CEF).
EKT participated in the European project CRAFTED through SearchCulture.gr. The project ran from September 2021 to June 2023 and was coordinated by the National Technical University of Athens. Its aim was to showcase Europe’s craft heritage by connecting digital cultural objects with the intangible knowledge they embody, including traditional techniques, skills and creative practices.
Through SearchCulture.gr, EKT contributed to the aggregation and promotion of Greek folk culture collections and to improving the quality of their metadata made available through Europeana, strengthening the international visibility and discoverability of Greek craft heritage. The project also explored machine learning technologies to support the semi-automatic annotation of digital cultural objects.
Infrastructure for the Aggregation, Documentation and Dissemination of Digital Content, Ensuring Interoperability, Long-Term Preservation and Open Access
Funding: NSRF 2014–2020 – Operational Programme “Public Sector Reform”, co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and national resources.
The project supported a major upgrade and expansion of SearchCulture.gr, focusing on the growth of digital collections, improved interoperability and the development of advanced search and exploration features for cultural content. A key achievement was the development of the Semantics.gr infrastructure and the use of controlled vocabularies for the systematic semantic enrichment of metadata. Linking cultural items to persons, places, subjects and other entities enabled new search and navigation services, including geographic search and interactive map-based exploration, as well as the creation of bilingual thematic exhibitions.
The project also significantly expanded the network of participating cultural heritage institutions and improved the quality of aggregated content. EKT developed and updated the Basic Interoperability Specifications and organised information and training activities for cultural institutions, helping establish common requirements for quality, openness and interoperability across Greece’s digital cultural heritage.
Funding: European Union – Connecting Europe Facility (CEF).
EKT participated in the European project Europeana Common Culture, coordinated by the Europeana Foundation. The project aimed to strengthen the role of national cultural content aggregators, harmonise aggregation policies and technologies, and increase the availability of high-quality, open-access cultural heritage content through Europeana.
Through SearchCulture.gr, EKT contributed approximately 300,000 additional Greek cultural heritage items to Europeana and improved the quality of their metadata. Participation in the project enhanced the international visibility of Greek digital collections and further strengthened SearchCulture.gr’s role as Greece’s National Aggregator for Europeana, reinforcing EKT’s collaboration with the European aggregation network.
Funding: NSRF 2007–2013 – Operational Programme “Digital Convergence”, co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and national resources.
SearchCulture.gr was established through the SaaS project, implemented by EKT to develop integrated services for the organisation, management and dissemination of open digital content. It was launched in 2015 as Greece’s National Aggregator of Digital Cultural Content, initially bringing together collections from 42 publicly funded cultural heritage digitisation projects. Complementary services were also developed, including the Validator for content quality and interoperability checks and the Preservator for long-term digital preservation.
A significant legacy of the project was the establishment of the Basic Interoperability Specifications for integrating digital collections into SearchCulture.gr. These specifications defined a common framework of requirements for metadata, digital files, interoperability and open licensing, laying the foundations for the systematic development of the National Aggregator and its integration with Europeana.
