Celebrate Heritage by Photographing and Sharing It with the World

Heritage Western Cape (HWC) is appealing to people in the Western Cape to participate in the international Wikipedia "Wiki Loves Monuments" photography competition. Members of the public can celebrate South Africa's living heritage by taking photos of monuments and heritage sites and uploading these onto the competition website.

This partnership between HWC, Wikimedia South Africa and WikiAfrica was officially launched in Cape Town on Saturday, 1 September 2012. The competition runs throughout the month of September, which is also Heritage Month in South Africa.

People all over the world will be uploading their photographs of sites that symbolise their cultural heritage (buildings, statues and shipwrecks, etc). These images become a part of the Wikimedia Commons, a database of over 13 million freely usable media files from all over the world.

The competition is organised separately in every participating country by the local Wikimedia community. The winners of the South African competition are expected to be announced at a prizegiving ceremony in Johannesburg in November this year. The best photographs from participating countries will also be entered into an international contest.