A Playful Journey Through the Finno-Ugric World Emerged at the HUM Hackathon
From 17–19 April, the HUM Data Lab organized a Cultural Data Hackathon at the Estonian Literary Museum in Tartu, bringing together students, researchers, developers, and cultural heritage enthusiasts. Over the course of three days, participants explored new ways of applying data in a creative and user-friendly way within the collections of memory institutions.
Participants, mentors, jury and organizers of the hackathon
A total of 25 participants formed six teams. They worked with a wide range of datasets, including folk songs, correspondence, court records, and historical architectural plans. By the end of the weekend, the teams had developed prototypes, games, data analyses, and visualizations that demonstrated how digital methods can open up new ways of interpreting and engaging with cultural heritage.
Exploring the Finno-Ugric World Through ENM's Data
The Estonian National Museum (ENM) provided two datasets for the hackathon. The first consisted of visitor log files from the museum’s permanent exhibition, enabling participants to study visitor movement patterns and interactions with exhibits. The second dataset contained information on approximately 10,000 objects from its Finno-Ugric collections, offering insights into cultural heritage items collected from different Finno-Ugric regions.
The Finno-Ugric collection proved to be popular among participants. Based on this dataset, Team No Game, No Life (Naveen Kumar Kandhasamypalayam, Laura Maria Alcaraz Vargas and Nuntakarn Bootnoi) created the game Aleksei’s Finno-Ugric Journey.
The game’s protagonist, Aleksei, is inspired by Estonian ethnographer Aleksei Peterson, whose fieldwork and collecting expeditions played an important role in shaping the Estonian National Museum’s collections. Together with Aleksei, players travel across Finno-Ugric regions, learn about local cultures, and collect cultural objects preserved in museum collections.
According to the creators, the greatest value of the hackathon was the opportunity to learn through hands-on experience. Within a short period of time, participants had to familiarize themselves with the data, test different ideas, collaborate with people from diverse backgrounds, and document their entire workflow. They particularly highlighted the creativity, collaboration, experimentation, and mentor support that helped them rapidly develop their ideas.
The prototype is currently available near the ENM library, where museum visitors can try it themselves and explore the museum’s collections and cultural heritage in a playful way.
The game created by the team No Game, No Life exhibited in ENM
The Winning Project Put Folk Songs on an Interactive Map
The jury, consisting of Maximilian Schich, Margaret Aidla, and Joshua Wilbur, selected Team Think Floyd’s project Tunes of the World Map as the winner of the hackathon.
The team included musicologist Inna Lisniak from Ukraine, computer scientist Hikmat Azimzade from Azerbaijan, and art historian and archaeologist İbrahim Göktürk Kılcan from Turkey. Their interactive map allows users to explore Estonian and Ukrainian folk songs from geographical, thematic, and emotional perspectives.
The project combines textual analysis, data visualization, and an interactive map application, helping to make large folk song collections accessible to both researchers and the wider public. According to the team, the hackathon demonstrated that the value of cultural heritage data lies not only in the data itself, but also in the questions that can be asked with it.
Photo by Agnes Aljas
A Meeting Place for the Humanities and Technology
The HUM Data Lab Hackathon demonstrated the vast potential of opening up and reusing cultural heritage data. Over three days, participants transformed archives, museum collections, and historical datasets into games, maps, visualizations, and interactive applications.
The event also brought together people from different fields—students, researchers, developers, and specialists from memory institutions—whose collaboration generated fresh ideas and new perspectives. Such initiatives help demonstrate that cultural heritage is not only about preserving the past, but also a valuable starting point for creating new knowledge, experiences, and technological solutions.
The next Cultural Data Hackathon is planned for mid-April 2027 at the National Library of Estonia.
Photo by: Agnes Aljas
The Estonian Research and Cultural Data Infrastructure is a national research infrastructure programme (2025–2029) that aims to connect and develop Estonia’s research and cultural data environments, making data more visible, accessible, and reusable for research, culture, and society at large. The programme is funded by the Estonian Research Council.