ExhibitFiles Latest Additions

Case Study: California Mapping Multitouch Exhibit

Mon, 23 Aug 2010 16:44:00 -0600

Earlier this year we worked with the Oakland Museum of California (OMCA) to create an exhibit allowing visitors to explore early maps of California. A multitouch table with custom software is a centerpiece within the larger exhibition space. OMCA describes the Gallery of California History: "The new gallery is based on the theme of Coming to California —an idea that evokes not only the arrivals and departures of people throughout human history and their interactions with the inhabitants already here, but also the notion of coming to terms with the influence of California on our individual and collective identities." California maps from 18th and 19th century help tell the story of Coming to California. Maps and other documents from various locations throughout the state can be examined, digitally through the exhibit software. Visitors can select maps and expand them through multitouch gestures. The maps and other documents show land ownership and usage. A major challenge in this exhibit was to present the regional maps and documents with enough detail in a multiuser environment. Since multiple users can interact simultaneously, we needed to limit the zoom size so that one visitor wouldn't be able take over the entire table surface while examining a map or document. We developed a magnifier feature that allows visitors to view details on any image, as well as the base map. The magnifier component resembles a "real" magnifier, so it is obvious to visitors as to what its purpose is. The table format and the shared touch surface help promote visitor interaction. At the opening, we were able to see this first-hand as visitors discussed the maps they were interacting with and even passed the magnifier across the table in one instance. From a design standpoint, creating a user interface(s) for multiple visitors is a huge challenge. Much of what we've learned to date is from direct observation, and we continue to apply what we learn to new exhibits. At the moment, there are only a few articles and research papers exploring this type of interaction. There is more to be learned, as these types of shared surface exhibits are still relatively rare. The exhibit software was developed in Adobe Flash and we used the GestureWorks framework (which we developed.) The documents in the exhibit are drawn from a Flickr account, making it simple to update. OMCA staff did all of the content development for the exhibit and they continue to maintain it through Flickr. This exhibit, like the rest of the Gallery of California is meant to be flexible and dynamic.

Case Study: Population Impact

Fri, 23 Apr 2010 05:30:35 -0600

What part do humans play on ecosystems? What part do ecosystems play on humans? Population Impact focuses on populations—of humans, plants, and other animals—and regional and global ecosystems: how the two are endlessly connected, and how they are affected by human decisions on the use of resources. The goal of this exhibition was to develop a permanent exhibition that leveraged the scientific assets of Carnegie Museum of Natural History to communicate three key messages about ecosystems and the results of human populations on the environment: 1. Earth’s resources sustain life; 2. Populations do not grow without consequences; and 3. Our human choices (decisions) affect the world that we live in, now and in the future. Topics discussed include: • the rate at which human population is growing, • how human population growth has a direct effect on the environment and the places where we live, • factors effecting population change (i.e. war, famine, age of first reproduction, natural disasters, birth control, healthcare) • human impact on white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus), • research by a Carnegie Museum of Natural History scientist about the need for genetic diversity of trees in urban areas, • research on animal and plant populations in Hispaniola being conducted by Carnegie Museum of Natural History researchers, • research on ecosystem dynamics being conducted by researchers at Powdermill Nature Reserve, the biological research station of Carnegie Museum of Natural History, • talk-back board, and • ways to make a difference (personally, locally, and globally)

Review: Run, Jump, Fly: Adventures in Action

Tue, 24 Aug 2010 17:53:45 -0600

Children's Discovery Museum of San Jose (CDM) is currently a Youth Museum Exhibit Collaborative (YMEC) participant. As such, we currently have on display Run, Jump, Fly: Adventures in Action, by Minnesota Children's Museum (MCM) - an incredible active-lifestyle focused exhibition! I have seen it's popularity from an employee's standpoint, but also as a mom 6 and 8 year old girls. My 6 year old learned how to do an entire run on the Monkey Bars this summer, as well as her first 'flip' on a Pull Up Bar - note, that I don't think flips are 'allowed,' but she was thrilled just the same. There is also a ski/surf simulator and a rock climbing wall among other amazing and health-focused activities. This was a wonderful way for kids to play indoors and do exercise. Like usual, MCM hit the mark!

Review: Digiark

Thu, 19 Aug 2010 09:27:06 -0600

This is a review of the Digiark gallery, not the specific exhibition currently on display. I first posted a version of this on the Museum 2.0 blog here: http://museumtwo.blogspot.com/2010/08/take-seat-beautiful-casual-areas-at.html The Digiark gallery is one of the best examples I've seen of a space made for leisurely exploration of content. They succeeded at designing a space that integrates lots of computers and projection-based work with natural light and recycled materials. The overall feel is of a hybrid industrial lab / comfortable home. Most of the story is in the photos and captions, but here are a few notable highlights: -flexible wall structure that both allows them to resegment the space in five minutes and to create a "floating" feel -slatted 2x4s everywhere create a sense of permeability that encourages social use and helps parents keep track of their kids -lots of comfortable seating, both facing art and facing the outdoors -assortment of stand-up and sit-down places to explore art -recycled materials with a delightful aesthetic touch: plastic water jugs serve as light fixtures and the bases of picnic tables, whimsical lamps made from recycled plastic, light wood everywhere -artists working live in the space. The flexible walls allow them to cordon off areas and I saw people fiddling with their installations while the whole venue was open There were a couple of negatives to the Digiark. Most significantly, the building itself was separated from the main museum and it was quite hard for people to naturally flow into the space--so few did. Also, there was not a lot of art per square foot - about 4000 square feet of space with five pieces featured, three of which were shown on standard size flatscreen TVs. There were other computers and books to check out, but I could see many institutions thinking it impractical to devote so much space to so few artworks/exhibits/artifacts. Visitors didn't seem to mind, though. They were happy to sit on the couches with an art book or space out.

Review: Divine Demons: Wrathful Deities of Buddhist Art

Mon, 12 Jul 2010 15:33:27 -0600

My friend Emily and I caught the exhibition "Divine Demons: Wrathful Deities of Buddhist Art" at the Norton Simon on a Saturday, just before it closed. For its dramatic title and its prominence on the Museum's website, the exhibition of paintings and objects from Tibet was startlingly small and nondescript, all of it contained in an alcove-like room off the entrance to the Asian collections on the lower level. The paintings and objects in the exhibition were marvelous: magical, intricate, and steeped in symbolism. The labels told you a little bit of the fascinating stories behind them: that the dagger was actually modeled after a tent peg, that the squashed figures getting trampled by demons represented ignorance. The introductory text suggested that wrathful deities were appropriate for the harsh climate and hardscrabble life of a high mountain environment. But the way the pieces were displayed didn't evoke a sense of magic or meaning. It felt like they were stuck in that alcove for convenience rather than placed there thoughtfully. I was excited about seeing this exhibit, and I would have liked to see that excitement reflected back in the way the objects were displayed. Perhaps if the room had some sort of entryway, something you had to step through, it would have felt like a differentiated place, and its smallness wouldn't have mattered. Perhaps there could have been some contextual photographs, like the ones art museums seem to be using more often to show you where a statue or chunk of architectural detail might have originally been housed. Or maybe simply spacing the objects further apart would have done it. We saw another exhibition at the Norton Simon the same day: "Hiroshige: Visions of Japan." Although the design for that exhibition is simple, there is a definite intention there that acknowledges the significance of the art -- an intention that seemed to be lacking from the exhibition that drew me there in the first place.

Review: Heaven and Earth II

Sat, 03 Jul 2010 12:08:36 -0600

The Heaven and Earth II Exhibit is a outdoor sculpture exhibition being put on at Carkeek Park in Seattle, WA. It is sponsored by the COCA (Center on Contemporary Art), the Associated Recreational Council, and Seattle Parks and Recreation. It is the second year this exhibition has gone up, with the themes of art, nature, and sustainability influencing the artists in their art and what materials they use to create it. Many of the pieces are made from recycled wood, glass, harvested wood, and reused wood, while others are supposed to make a statement about how we are using our environment. Most of the work is close to the various park’s parking lots, but my favorite pieces are in Piper’s Orchard, and worth the hike over. There is also a camera obscura set up which is science-y and fun to play with. According to the artist statement parks used to often have these, and I think they should bring them back! Overall, I think the art is well-placed, and integrates well into the surrounding environment but also stands out enough that it catches your eye and makes you consider the surroundings as well as the art. It’s like going on a treasure hunt to find some of these things, and you are pleasantly rewarded. I love these sorts of opportunities for art to be integrated with already-existing environments and seeing how they play off each other. Outdoor exhibitions also provide people with an opportunity to see art w/o having to pay for it or making it “precious.” I think there is an instinctual impulse to create or make their mark on the world, and to experience other people’s marks, like songs or chalk drawings. We want to be included, and outdoor art allows that. The only drawback to this is when people feel they have a right to alter or add their own mark to someone else’s. It is disrespectful to interrupt someone’s song, and it is disrespectful to add Sessions bottles to the tree sculpture, or to add writing to the natural wood benches. But that doesn’t mean these sorts of exhibits shouldn’t take place. In fact, I think if people are exposed to these types of exhibits more often, they won’t seem so weird or foreign, and in turn people will feel less compelled to mess with them. But it is also part of human nature to toy and mess with stuff, and that includes graffiti. Anyway, enough of my tangent, onto the art: There are 13 pieces in all, and most are clustered together, but taking the map along with you (available at the Environmental Learning Center) helps to make sure you don’t miss one. The map also provides an explanation of each of the pieces. I’m always ambivalent about having artists explain their work to me, but some of the artists descriptions point out elements of the pieces you might have noticed, or history you may not have known before. The opening exhibition was June 26, and artwork is on display until September 26. Make a morning or afternoon of it – bring a picnic, give yourself time to wander for at least an hour and a half (you’ll be stopping a lot to look through the camera obscura, looking at plants, etc.)

Review: Who Am I?

Thu, 01 Jul 2010 08:20:01 -0600

Wow. This new exhibit is beautiful, fun, surprising, sophisticated, and cool. The room itself is divided into 5 main areas. The entry experience is a giant wall and floor filled with falling multicolored digital confetti. As you get closer the confetti begins to organize into a shape roughly the size of your body. Sure we have all seen this technology before. But this intro actually serves as an intro to design motifs used throughout the zone, as well as setting up a use of technology throughout. Plus they picked really pretty colors and the scale made the whole thing really impactful. The main space of the gallery contains a central zone with glass display cases filled with layers of artifacts, text, collections, specimens, items cast specifically for this exhibit, and artworks. Some of these are see-through so that sightlines are maintained. The aesthetics here are again fantastic. Some things are a little weird - brass casts of facial muscles eg - but there is a sense of humor, a good mix of serious and odd, and a sense that you can dive into whatever depth you want to. This is not linear - although each case has an organizing theme - but somehow the associative, or topical, logic is responsive to individual lines of inquiry or just whatever catches your unique eye. On either side of these cases are a series of polished silver pods on stilts. These look like hovering blobs, and they reminded me of Karim Rashid's furniture. But their rounded edges and reflective surfaces beckon. Each pod contains a number of screens with interactive games: What's Your Sex? My Brain, My Body, About Me, Teach Me, etc. Many of these use the visitor as a participant. One station scans your fingertips, tells you about fingerprints, and then invites you to make a digital fingerprint puppet. Another scans your eye. One on emotion has you put your hand into a small box and then shows pictures like spiders while measuring your response through biofeedback. After using any of these the machines say goodbye and "thank you for contributing". It wasn't entirely clear but it seems the museum is storing data as it goes. Scattered throughout are stations that say "this is for kids" and suggest something for an adult to do with their child. So for example, there were 2 black boxes where kids are encouraged to put their hands without looking. A less technological and more immediately understandable interactive that paralleled the adult exhibit. I thought this was a nice touch and allows an adult to feel their child is welcome in the zone, but it did underscore how adult the exhibit is overall. Finally, in the middle of the space, is a game all about you! The design again is important - two large white tables with curved, sloping tops. Inset into the surface are a series of paired screens - one large and one small. The large is a touch screen and the small displays your progress. Starting by choosing your initials and gender; the small screen displays a corresponding picture. Then it asks you to do a reaction time game, to pick foods you like to eat, your favorite color, your ability to differentiate the word "purple" written in purple from the word purple written in black, how many hours of sleep you get a night. . . In all I think there were 12 games to build your profile. As other people join at the other stations in the table it syncs with their activity so you are all playing the reaction time game together. When you get your results the feedback also includes how well you did compared to the other players. Initially this was a little strange - it created a small lag as it sync'd, and I think it skipped a game for me. But it was overall very fun and I played the whole thing. At the end your picture shows up in the same confetti pattern you encountered at the entry but this time large on the back wall, with others that people have created in the gallery. You have progressed from the ephemeral view of yourself at the entry to a more solid, durable part of a community, and part of you will stay behind when you leave. There is also a live science research component near the start of the gallery called "Live Science". They are currently studying how we use our sense to make sense of the environment. The initial research team is from Royal Holloway, University of London. While not in use there are interactive screens that ask about your sleep habits and interpret your dreams. A cool take on citizen science. Prior to the show opening the Science Museum invited the community to create self-portrait dolls. Many people knit theirs, others sewed them or adapted figurines. As part of the grand opening these dolls were installed in a case on the first floor, near the shop and the main entrance. I thought these were lovely, fun, and witty. There were over 300 submissions and the effect as a way of introducing the exhibit - participatory, visitor-centered, encouraging reflection, personal - cleverly captured the main themes and personality of the experience deeper within the museum.

Review: Inside White Space: Portraits of Black and Brown Power in the Institution

Tue, 29 Jun 2010 09:18:22 -0600

You probably wouldn't expect the Museum of African American Art (MAAA) in Los Angeles to be housed in a shopping mall. And I don't mean the kind of alternative "Anti-Mall" I happened upon the day before, where one wouldn't be surprised to find a gallery of some kind. I mean the Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza, a regular old shopping mall with elevators and fake plants, those big shiny floor tiles, and no injunctions about living consciously. It's curious enough that this museum is in such a mall, but check this out: It's inside Macy's. On the third floor. Way off in a corner. Behind the vacuum cleaners. However, when you think about it, the idea of putting a museum in a shopping mall -- a place where people congregate -- is kind of neat. It's like bringing your museum to the people instead of asking them to come to you. And I'm given to understand that the Museum's location in the mall was purposeful. Apparently, MAAA's founder had this idea that the Museum should be inside not only a mall, but a department store, presumably because she really wanted the Museum to reach out to the community. From that standpoint, the Crenshaw Plaza is the perfect mall for the purpose. Unlike L.A.'s flashy destination malls, this one serves the immediate community; it has a post office and a place where you can buy Metro passes. Still, in order to visit the Museum, you must find the right corner of Macy's third floor, on your own and without any directional signs, and then proceed down a long and featureless hall, which was doubtless originally designed to keep out the public, all the while wondering whether you're about to stumble into the receiving department. The institutional double doors into the museum are another barrier. So is the scolding chime that sounds when you cross the threshold. If you do make it into the museum, there's no shortage of friendliness from the staff, who welcome you jovially from behind what looks like a former gift-wrapping counter. Still, a casual visitor would be confused about what this place is, exactly. The gift shop, which you're likely to encounter first, offers art that looks traditional and African. Yet the museum exhibits the work of local contemporary artists. And the exhibit space itself feels cold and stark compared to the lively activity of the entry area, as if the important part of the museum were the offices rather than the gallery. The current exhibition is "Inside White Space: Portraits of Black and Brown Power in the Institution," photographs by Camilo Cruz. And I was pleased to see that here, the photographs were each given plenty of space — something I found sadly lacking on a recent visit to the Annenberg Space for Photography. There were no labels (the artist's decision, I was told), just an artist's statement, in English and Spanish, pasted to the wall. And really, there was no need for labels — the exhibition's title provided enough of an explanation. These photographs were all of a type, all variations on the same message. People in uniforms or flashy suits or other identity-claiming outfits looked simultaneously despondent and triumphant next to marble walls, roman columns, conference tables, and potted ficus trees — as if they'd arrived, after a long climb, at the pinnacle of white America, only to find a lackluster emptiness. The photographs' display, I thought, was successful. The simplicity of a well-done photography exhibition was especially impressive to me after my visit to the Annenberg, where so much money had obviously been poured into a show that befuddled. So, the MAAA redefines what goes into a mall. And if the shopping center I'd visited the day before defines itself as a place with cultural meaning, why shouldn't this place of culture succeed in crafting an identity for itself in the mall?