Record high interest in the World Heritage Scholarship

The application period for the international World Heritage Scholarship has now ended and the interest proved to be record-breaking. A total of nearly a thousand people (993) have applied for the World Heritage Scholarship. Never before have so many applications been received.

The World Heritage Decorated Farmhouses of Hälsingland Scholarship/residency (World Heritage Scholarship) was established in 2018 by the Region of Gävleborg. The scholarship is aimed for persons who have an artistic idea connected to UNESCO's World Heritage List, are interested in the World Heritage Decorated Farmhouses of Hälsingland, and can connect the site to other World Heritage sites in an artistic or researching way. The scholarship is open to artists, researchers and other cultural practitioners.

– We realized at the beginning of the application period that interest would be good this year, says Anna-Karin Ferm, cultural developer for World Heritage Decoraterd Farmhouses of Hälsingland at the Region of Gävleborg (Sweden).

– Usually, most applications come in at the end of the period, but this time we saw that the interest was high from the start.

Not only was the number of applications high this year, the number of countries from which the applications came from has never been so many. Applications from 100 countries was recived with creative and artistic ideas on how the Decorated Farmhouses of Hälsingland can be connected to other World Heritage sites around the World, from example Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Bahrain, Brazil, Bolivia, Canada, Colombia, Cameroon, Denmark, Finland, France, India, Japan, Mexico, Mali, Pakistan, Peru, Qatar, Rwanda, Switzerland, Somalia, South Korea, Sri Lanka, UK, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Vietnam, Yemen and many many more.

– The applications comes from all continents. It is incredibly gratifying that the information of the scholarship has reached out this far. We feel that it is truly in the spirit of the World Heritage Convention and UNESCO – to build bridges between countries and their World Heritage sites, continues Anna-Karin.

The selected scholarship holder will be allowed to live for a month at one of the World Heritage farms; Kristofers in Järvsö or Erik-Anders in Söderala and will also receive a scholarship of 50,000 SEK for realizing their idea. Travel to and from Hälsingland is included.

Now the work of reading the applications begins. The work should be completed before the summer. Then we will see who will be appointed as the 2025 World Heritage Scholarship Holder.