Deadline: 10 January 2020

The Prince Claus Fund, through its Cultural Emergency Response (CER) programme and the Whiting Foundation have announced a third round of the Open Call for First Aid to Documentary Heritage under Threat for projects in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Caribbean to safeguard documentary heritage that is acutely threatened by recent conflict or other disaster, whether natural or man-made.

This third round will continue to expand the scope of this initiative and facilitate the vital work of safeguarding physical objects and making the information they carry accessible to a wider public for generations to come. In doing so, they hope to contribute to the appreciation of cultural achievement and historical diversity and foster the worldwide dissemination of forgotten or endangered stories.

Funding Information

• Grants will average about €15,000.
• Grant funds can only cover project-related expenses, not running (operating) costs for organisations.
• No support will be provided retroactively (i.e., to projects already implemented).

Eligibility Criteria

• The project must aim to safeguard documentary heritage (i.e., cultural heritage designed to carry information in writing, such as manuscripts, books, archives, tablets, and carvings or inscriptions).
• The project must respond to an emergency situation, and must be to preserve or disseminate documentary heritage threatened or recently affected by an acute, current, or impending conflict, natural disaster, or other condition that pose an acute risk. Cases of long-term neglect are not eligible.
• The country where the intervention is to take place must be in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Caribbean, and the applying organisation or individual must live and work in one of these regions.
• The heritage involved must be significant for a specific community, whether local, regional, national, or global.
• Local communities, a local organisation, and/or local authorities must be involved in the emergency response, preferably leading it, and the legal owner must support the proposed measures.
• The intervention must be able to be carried out within a time frame of twelve months, corresponding to the emergency character of the collaboration.
• No direct or indirect support will be provided to individuals or organisations currently subject to US sanctions.
• Through its activities, the project must contribute to increasing the accessibility of the affected documentary heritage and the dissemination of the stories it holds.
• The project could, among other things, fulfil one or several of the following aims:
  • Emergency conservation, preservation, and restoration for the urgent safeguarding and stabilization of damaged and/or threatened documentary heritage.
  • Emergency digitization, documentation, or scanning of damaged and/or threatened documentary heritage.
  • Evacuation and/or relocation of threatened collections.
  • (Re-) organization, cataloguing, inventorying, and documentation to enhance the accessibility of collections for researchers and other users.
  • The restoration and/or improvement of storage facilities, and the enhancement of safety and security conditions for the sustainable preservation of collections.
  • Capacity building and training activities to enhance the abilities of the caretakers of the collection and other stakeholders, for example in restoration and conservation skills, inventory methodologies, and digitization.
  • Dissemination and awareness-raising activities to increase access to the documentary heritage and to bring it to the attention of the larger public, for example through educational programmes, exhibitions, or workshops for the surrounding communities. (Note: these activities can only be part of a larger project aiming at safeguarding and improving access to documentary heritage).

Selection Criteria

Projects will be evaluated by Prince Claus Fund staff and external expert reviewers. The selection criteria are:

• Urgency of the need identified – the threat of imminent loss of the affected heritage must be pressing.
• Soundness and sustainability of the plan for preservation and/or dissemination – the plan must be feasible, realistic, and well thought out to prevent or limit future vulnerability.
• Significance of the threatened documentary heritage to local, regional, and/or world communities – the heritage must be of value to an identified group of people

How to Apply

Applicants must submit their applications at the address given on the website.

Eligible Countries:

• Africa: Algeria, Angola, Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cape Verde, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Congo, Republic of the Congo, Democratic Republic of the, Cote d’Ivorie, Djibouti, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Mauritius, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Sao Tome and Principe, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Somalia, South Africa, South Sudan, Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania, Togo, Tunisia, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe
• Asia: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Brunei, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Malaysia, Maldives, Mongolia, Myanmar (Burma), Nepal, North Korea, Oman, Pakistan, Philippines, Qatar, Russia, Singapore, South Korea, Sri Lanka, Tajikistan, Thailand, Timor-Leste, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Vietnam
• Latin America and the Caribbean: Argentina, Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, The Bahamas, Belize, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Dominica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Grenada, Guyana, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica, Mexico, Nicaragua, Paraguay, Panama, Peru, Saint Lucia, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, Uruguay, Venezuela

For more information, please visit https://princeclausfund.org/open-call-first-aid-to-documentary-heritage-under-threat-2019