Cultural Heritage, Digital Archiving and City Branding in the Context of Festival Posters: The Troy Festival Poster Competition Example

This research examines the relationships between cultural memory, digital archiving, and city branding through the lens of the Troy Festival Poster Design Competitions. Assuming that festival posters are not merely promotional visual products but also cultural heritage elements representing Çanakkale's mythological, historical, and geographical identity, the study is designed as a case study within the framework of qualitative research methods. Document review, literature review, and visual analysis of the limited number of accessible posters were conducted; data was collected on the themes of cultural representation, archiving practices, and city branding. The findings show that symbolic images such as horses, pigeons, and the sea are used extensively in the Troy Festival posters; these visual repetitions reinforce the city's identity as a "city of history and culture." However, the lack of systematic storage of the posters produced within the scope of the competition in high-resolution digital archives, the absence of metadata, and access restrictions point to a significant gap in terms of the sustainability of cultural memory. In the context of city branding, it was observed that the posters contributed to Çanakkale's national and international visibility; however, the reliance on a limited number of symbols in the visual repertoire reduced thematic diversity. The study emphasizes the need to collect festival posters in comprehensive digital archives, establish metadata standards, and develop new approaches that encourage design diversity. While the research has some limitations in scope due to the limited amount of available data, it reveals that festival posters are a strategic resource in the context of cultural heritage, visual communication, and urban identity.