Museum Techmuse

NEMA Conference: Good friends and good times...

There's a lot to be said for "going local" on the conference front.  I go to a lot of national museum conferences (AAM, ASTC, ACM, AASLH, etc), but our own New England Museum Association (NEMA) conference was hard to beat this year in terms of sheer collegiality and basic fun.

Most of my time is spent in the exhibit hall in our booth, so a pleasure to have my long-time friends from the science museum world Paul Orselli, Clifford Wagner, and Ken Gleason show up and hang out. Pleasure also to see Jan Crocker, Lynn Baum, and Deb Sovinee -- my fellow exhibit developers South Of Boston (Museum S.O.B.'s we're thinking for our meetup name). I brought my new ukulele to practice during slow times, and who should show up by Reg Bacon, longtime NEMA friend and New England's premiere vaudeville performer/historian. Reg took over the ukulele, and for once I can say I had the most happening booth in the exhibit hall.

Hats off to Dan Yeager making NEMA such a friendly place to exhibit, and Leslie Howard for tweeting the Emerging Museum Professional group.  And to Kate MacIntosh (aka @laurelBean) for leading the way on our Thursday night "tweet up", where we sat around a pub table, had some libations, and tweeted with new friends.

Like ASTC a few weeks ago (see blog entry below), I captured stories told by people's shoes in the exhibit hall 

 
Reg Bacon took over my ukulele and suddenly the booth was happening!

Mercer Museum demo at ASTC: Shoe Stories

What fun to demo our installation for The Mercer Museum at ASTC in Baltimore. In the exhibit, we ask visitors: "What stories do you shoes have to tell?"  With camera mounted at foot-level, visitors pose their shoes and tell their story, often from the perspective of their shoes, and sometimes even in a special shoe voice.

Some great stories at ASTC, from salt-encrusted shoes intent on giving blisters, to the attitude of a pair of city slicker cowboy boots, to diversions at home regarding the price paid for shoes at an outlet store.

Amazing, the power of asking an intriguing question and providing a forum for answers. And there's a special dynamic when visitors have an object on hand to talk about.  (Oop -- should have said "...on foot to talk about".  So bad...)

Prepping for ASTC

I've been browsing through past issues of ASTC Dimensions a bit, thinking about where things are going with science centers. Just reading the titles on the front covers says a lot. Some that catch my attention: "Forging the Connection to Local Leaders and Communities", "Global Issues, Local Efforts", "Opening Doors and Extending Our Reach".  And a few years ago: "A Powerful Force for Good: Science Centers and Social Issues."

Big stuff. More than what's likely to happen in a few visits to through exhibits.  Stuff that requires communication, coordination, and inspiration among groups of motivated users.  Stories and social media, definitely a role to play.  But the prime mover I think is the commitment of the institution itself, and especially the work coming out of the public programs departments.  But my brain hurts when I try to wrap my thoughts around this -- it's very complex.  Then I become a lot more interested in quirky soulful exhibits, like asking people to tell a story about their shoes (which we did at the Mercer Museum). Maybe there's a way of combining the two: grand and quirky.  Must be some examples out there...

Scrolling through the Dead Sea Scrolls

I spent some time this morning scrolling through the new Digital Dead Sea Scrolls website by the Israel Museum in Jerusalem. I have to say, I'm a total Joe Schmoe when it comes to the Dead Sea Scrolls -- I know they were important, were discovered in the last 50 years or so, and gave us some new books for, um, versions for, um...Well, they were important.

That said, the central feature of the scrolls for me: they scroll.  In fact, they scroll very nicely -- it's a satisfying and visually pleasing interface.  One thing I discovered -- they scroll from right to left, a big discovery for schmoes like me that emerges through interaction. Another nice feature: you can roll over sections for immediate translation into English.  And, a big feature: you can zoom in to a 1200 mega-pixel image of sections of the scroll. As I wrote in my blog entry on Google Art Project, this zoom leads to a much more personal (and sometimes idiosyncratic) connection to the work. In my case, I think I found a couple sections in the Great Isaiah Scroll where the scribe made a mistake -- wrote over a letter in heavier ink or had to insert text in the space between lines. I felt a human connection to whoever it was who held that pen or quill or whatever it was.

There are some interesting (and not too long) videos with an introduction from the curator for each of the scrolls -- I enjoyed picking up on his enthusiasm and it added to the sense of wonder for the images about to be revealed to me.  There is a comments section, notably with a "translate" button needed because of the worldwide interest in the work.  And a final note: some museums still ask the question: "Will we get fewer visitors to our museum if we put it online?"  We've moved beyond that question now...prior to viewing the website, I didn't even know where the Dead Sea Scrolls were housed.  Now the Israel Museum and actual scrolls are on my map of destinations to visit someday. Nicely done.

Going out to the community: Civil War Roadshow

Pleased to have developed a custom installation of our StoryKiosk software for the Civil War Roadshow, an exhibit traveling to communities in Pennsylvania for four years in a 53-foot tractor-trailer.  Visitors are invited ahead of time to bring an artifact that they'd like to talk about. They take snapshots of the object at the video station then record their story, which is then uploaded to the Roadshow website.

It's an approach I'm seeing more and more of: traveling out to community events to reach the public beyond the walls of the museum (see our recent StoryKiosk installation in New Zealand). Visitors and their stories of course live outside the museum, and it isn't practical to ask visitors from far away to bring their valued objects to the museum.  Having an object to show and talk about is one of the factors in my experience that greatly increases the power of collected stories.

A pleasure to be called onto this project by Fred Brink and and company A More Perfect Union. And another pleasant surprize that I didn't realize until nearly the end of the project: the whole exhibit was designed by longtime colleague and friend Aaron Goldblatt at Metcalfe Architecture and Design.

Remote Connections: Storykiosk installation in New Zealand

I've been logging in remotely to our Storykiosk installation in New Zealand -- (sadly I didn't get to travel in person). But I'm primed about the installation: it's on the road, traveling in a truck around the country gathering rugby stories, part of the Oranges at Halftime exhibit and REAL New Zealand Festival.

We put this together in a pretty short period of time using our ready-to-go rental platform after being contacted by Morgan Davie at Eklektus Inc. in NZ a couple months ago.  (The world being what it is these days, Morgan found me and connected up initially via my twitter Techmuse account).  A pleasure to work with Morgan and team -- they recorded national NZ sportscaster Keith Quinn inviting visitors to record their stories, some of which may be broadcast on his radio program at the conclusion of the exhibit tour.

The museum world changed while I wasn't looking...

I've been keeping busy as I need the last 10 years focusing on visitors' stories in exhibits (recording them, emailing them, posting to social media, etc).  And it's all been *exhibit* based. Or, maybe I should say, *but* it's all been exhibit based.  I've come to realize recently that while I've been focusing on exhibits, some of the best work in learning and museums has come from programs, those extensions out to community groups that don't necessarily originate in the exhibit. 

Am I the only one who didn't catch this?  I feel like a dope.  When I think back to websites at Museums and the Web, the ones that catch my fancy are the outreach sites not originating in a particular exhibit.  I always like the Meet Me project from MOMA in this regard.  And of course, all the social media outreach is hard to confine to a particular exhibit.

Museums are changing.  Not all museums, but the trendsetters.  Collections were the founding hub for museums, then exhibits (and visitor-centered exhibits) took much limelight. Now I think programs and outreach emerge as the star for museum learning.

 

The rise of public programming in museums

Here's something I've been thinking about after my conversation with Beck Tench: the area for real action in museum learning may be in the "public programs" department rather than the "exhibits" department.  I grew up in the museum field at Boston Children's Museum in the exhibits department, and I've always assumed that's where the fulcrum is for museum learning.  I'm not so sure about that now...

My focus in museum exhibits has always been to use the exhibit (and visitors' stories in the exhibit) as the means for developing an extended relationship with the visitor.  So we send visitors' off into the world (and back home) with options for reconnecting.  But where does that reconnecting live?  Probably not the exhibits department.  Maybe public programs.  Or maybe social marketing.

One example: the Levine Museum of the New South (where I have an installation) has been doing a great job bringing community groups (and business groups) in through the exhibit for an extended program designed to encourage dialogue on diversity in the South.

What other examples are out there, where technology is used to encourage community participation through programs? Who is doing good work on this?...

Catching up with Beck Tench

At AAM, I had a chance to sit down with Beck Tench at the end of a conference day -- I’ve been looking forward to catching up with her for a year or so since I first heard her talk about her role as Director for Innovation and Digital Engagement at the Museum of Life and Science in Durham, NC.

Here’s what’s she’s doing that is so fascinating and relevant/revolutionary to our work with museums and learning: she's led the development of "Experimonth," a series of month-long explorations of experiential topics such as raw foods, haiku, and mood (the current topic).  For thirty days, Web based participants explore the topic via a project blog. Fascinating stuff. I wanted to jump right in and participate when I heard the topics (though Beck says raw foods was a tough one).

A key moment while we talked: Beck pointed out that she's in the "programs" department, not the "exhibits" department. I let that sink in a bit. When I was a staff member at Boston Children's Museum a decade ago, exhibits was always where the action was.  I was never that aware of programs.  But changes are afoot -- if we’re truly going to impact visitors' lives, it’s going to take more than a museum visit a few times a year.  It’s going to take regular programming.  And month-long commitments. On the horizon: programs rise in importance in museums, especially cutting edge ones that engage visitors/participants over an extended time.

 

Espionage and the Museum Experience

Went last night to an enjoyable get together of the Themed Entertainment Association chapter here in MA (who knew we had a local chapter so far from Orlando?) at the 5 Wits venue at Patriot Place mall.  It's basically a 40 minute or so themed entertainment adventure where you become a spy or venture 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.  Very interesting. Spent my time dodging laser beams and cracking a safe along with 10 or so new-found colleagues.

Five or more years ago, NAME had an event at 5Wits original venue in Boston, and I remember being struck what a unique type of venue it was. Mini theme-park experience in an urban environment focusing on problem solving and group experience.  Nice to see they are still around.  And a few things we in the museum world might learn from -- ways of catching people even in non-traditional environments, engaging them in group experience.

Turns out they also do development outside their venue, and one of their first gigs years ago was for the International Spy Museum working closely with (would you guess?) Nina Simon. This all loosens up the concept of what an exhibit experience might be, pointing toward more themed group experiences.