This year marks the 12th edition of the Heritage in Motion Award, which celebrates the best multimedia and digital achievements in cultural heritage. In 2026, the competition received submissions from over 30 projects from 19 countries across Europe and beyond — including Canada, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Israel — confirming its role as a unique platform highlighting the transformative role of digital technologies in the preservation, promotion, and accessibility of cultural heritage.
This edition introduced two important novelties: for the first time, Heritage in Motion hosted a dedicated Festival in Bled, Slovenia, bringing together finalists, jury members, heritage professionals and filmmakers for two days of presentations, screenings and dialogue in one of Europe’s most beautiful settings.
Overall Winner
Water & Land. Intangible Heritage as a Driver for a Climate-Resilient Future (Belgium)
Jury Motivation
Water & Land demonstrates that intangible heritage is not a relic of the past, but a living resource for the future. Through a compelling documentary journey across Belgium and the Netherlands, the film gives voice to farmers, heritage bearers and researchers who keep traditional ecological knowledge alive — and shows how these practices offer concrete answers to the challenges of climate change. The jury celebrates Water & Land as the Heritage in Motion 2026 Overall Winner: a film that is both beautiful and necessary.
Project Description
Water & Land explores how living heritage can contribute to a more climate-resilient future. Through case studies in Belgium and the Netherlands, heritage bearers, farmers, volunteers and researchers show how practices such as traditional irrigation, hedge laying, water mills and composting retain ecological, cultural and social relevance today. With reflections by Ignace Schops and Gertjan de Boer, the documentary highlights the value of local knowledge and traditional practices as active tools for climate adaptation and biodiversity restoration.
Credits
Participating Institutions
Winners in the following categories
AGLAIA – ARIADNE
Glossary in Italian Sign Language and International Sign for Archaeology (Italy)
Jury Motivation
AGLAIA addresses a genuine and often overlooked gap in heritage communication: the accessibility of archaeological terminology for Deaf audiences. Through carefully crafted sign-language videos, it demonstrates that inclusion is itself a powerful form of innovation. The jury celebrates AGLAIA as an outstanding and inspiring example of socially meaningful heritage communication.
Project Description
AGLAIA – ARIADNE Glossary in Italian Sign Language and International Sign for Archaeology is an inclusive audiovisual project developed by PRISMA Cultura and ARIADNE Research Infrastructure within the European project ATRIUM. Through short sign-language videos dedicated to archaeological terminology, the project aims to make museums, guided tours, and cultural heritage interpretation more accessible to Deaf audiences. Combining accessibility, cultural heritage, and digital dissemination, AGLAIA promotes a more inclusive way of communicating archaeology across international contexts. The project was publicly presented at tourismA – International Exhibition of Archaeology (Florence, Italy, 2026).
Credits
Participating Institutions
Fighting with words.
In a Clandestine Printing Shop (Poland)
Jury Motivation
Fighting with words. In a Clandestine Printing Shop transforms a historic setting into a living, episodic narrative — 15 micro-stories, five rooms, and the voices of the protagonists themselves guiding visitors through a century-old secret. The jury celebrates this project as an outstanding achievement in spatial storytelling: technology in the service of history, and history made urgently, personally present.
Project Description
Fighting with words. In a Clandestine Printing Shop is a pioneering XR experience created at the Józef Piłsudski Museum in Łódź, in the very rooms where Józef and Maria Piłsudski once lived — and secretly ran a clandestine printing shop over a century ago. The experience is structured like a television series: 15 micro-stories unfolding across five interconnected rooms, lasting approximately 25 minutes. Visitors explore the space using AR tablets or Meta Quest 3 headsets, through which objects and environments reveal their secrets in animated XR layers. The tour is narrated by the voices of Maria and Józef Piłsudski themselves. Two versions of the experience — one for adults, one for children — ensure the narrative reaches every visitor. The project was named Discovery of the Year 2025 by the Regional Tourist Organization.
Credits
Participating Institutions
Water & Land.
Intangible Heritage as a Driver for a Climate-Resilient Future (Belgium)
Jury Motivation
Water & Land demonstrates that intangible heritage is not a relic of the past, but a living resource for the future. Through a compelling documentary journey across Belgium and the Netherlands, the film gives voice to farmers, heritage bearers and researchers who keep traditional ecological knowledge alive — and shows how these practices offer concrete answers to the challenges of climate change. The jury celebrates Water & Land as the Heritage in Motion 2026 Overall Winner: a film that is both beautiful and necessary.
Project Description
Water & Land explores how living heritage can contribute to a more climate-resilient future. Through case studies in Belgium and the Netherlands, heritage bearers, farmers, volunteers and researchers show how practices such as traditional irrigation, hedge laying, water mills and composting retain ecological, cultural and social relevance today. With reflections by Ignace Schops and Gertjan de Boer, the documentary highlights the value of local knowledge and traditional practices as active tools for climate adaptation and biodiversity restoration.
Credits
Participating Institutions
That’s what the canoe gives you
(Canada)
Jury Motivation
That’s what the canoe gives you documents a collective journey of making — the slow, deliberate construction of a traditional Anishinaabe birchbark canoe, led by master craftsman Karl Chevrier. With deep sensitivity to both the material and spiritual dimensions of the process, the film celebrates living traditions that are too rarely seen on screen. The Museums in Short jury recognises this project as an outstanding act of cultural preservation and a testimony to the enduring power of transmitted knowledge.
Project Description
The wonderful adventure of learning how to build a traditional Anishinaabe birchbark canoe began in June 2024. Led by Karl Chevrier, a master of living traditions, this project was described by one of the participants as “a kind of odyssey — a quest for a lost treasure amidst the hustle and bustle of the modern world.” Six participants experienced an unforgettable personal and professional journey. The film, directed by Dominic Leclerc, retraces the construction of the canoe from the gathering of birch bark and roots in the forest, through the handcrafted assembly with rudimentary tools, to the finishing of the canoe and its ceremonial launching on September 4, 2025. The birchbark canoe was presented to the Timiskaming First Nation community during the MIAJA event, organized by Minwashin. The band council will be responsible for the preservation and promotion of this canoe.
Credits
Participating Institutions
