Museum Techmuse

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.

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.

Bishop Museum: Culture, Science, and Spirit

Enjoyed the ASTC reception last night at the Bishop Museum -- and how could I not? A Hawaiian luau, with  food (including the mysterious poi, top notch live music both traditional and contemporary, and a few strong mai tais). But what struck me from a museum perspective is how well the institution as a whole integrates the disparate domains of culture, science, and spirit.

The historic building houses the more cultural exhibits (including Hawaiian Hall), and the new Science Adventure Center is a separate building focusing on the natural wonders of Hawaii.  But themes mingle between the two buildings.

I was struck by the Hawaiian Origins Tunnel in the Science Adventure Center. Visitors walk through a dark tunnel with brightly lit images that are key to traditional understandings of Hawaii's origins. It struck me that it would be very hard to do this in the continental U.S., where issues of science, culture, and spirit are much more polarized.  Maybe it has something to do with the fact that the natural wonders of Hawaii are so abundant, and provide a base of understanding that speaks beyond ideologies. (Note the quote from the scientist and cultural advisor, if you can read it in my blurry photo).

 

Visitor Stories as the Link to Other Cultures

Here we come to the topic that launched me into this fascinating career: uses of technology that encourage compassionate awareness of other cultures. It's the bridge that carried me from Harvard Ed School to Boston Children's Museum, through the Teen Tokyo and Kids' Bridge exhibits.

Visitor-created media is on the rise -- we're acknowledging as a field that the visitor's own experience is an essential part of the exhibit.  This experience, and the stories that come out of it, I think are the link sought after in so many children's museum cultural exhibits.

For the "Take Me There: Egypt" exhibit at The Children's Museum of Indianapolis, we ask visitors to choose a photo from the exhibit and talk about it, emailing their story home or to a friend. And for "Song of Korea" at the Austin Children's Museum, we invited families to sing a song in their native language. One of my all time favorite visitor-recordings was in Playspace at Boston Children's Museum: a mother and pre-school daughter from Taiwan sang a traditional tune together, the daughter spontaneous and free spirited as the mother sang in the background scaffolding her daughter's exploration. Translates well no matter what language you speak...

 

 

MW2010 Notes: Children/Family programs in the U.K.

I was struck this year at Museums and the Web by the quality (and quantity) of technology-facilitated programs for family audiences at museums in the U.K. Having grown as a staffer in the children's museum community here in the U.S., I've often wondered what we can learn from examples over the ocean. Now we have some nice models.

Shelley Mannion and Lorna O'Brien presented work they are doing at the British Museum and the Victoria & Albert Museum respectively. I didn't have a chance to explore the V&A's programming, but saw some of the extraordinary work Shelley and team are doing at the British Museum. Family workshops in the new Samsung Digital Discovery Centre mix images of objects in their collection with digital creativity tools. (I enjoyed seeing, for example, how the McKelvie family inserted themselves into Egyptian hieroglyphics. Bonus: families have an enjoyable experience building connections to other cultures).

I didn't catch Coula Charitonos' presentation on her research on the Tate Kids website, but did enjoy browsing the site. And also was interested to see the work that Culture24 has been doing aggregating museum content for children at www.show.me.uk and in their new prototype moderated community site for kids, Caboodle. An abundance of models to learn from...

CSI installation: Dublin

I'm back, with jet lag, from the StoryKiosk installation in "CSI: The Experience" in Dublin. The installation is part of the popular exhibit developed by the Fort Worth Museum of Science and History a couple years ago, now on its parallel tour through Europe.

Very interesting to see how museum exhibits can fan their way out into other public venues beyond museum walls. In Dublin, the exhibit is running at the Ambassador Theatre, a historic building tracing its roots back to 1764, now a venue for special events. And soon it will open at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. Very interesting indeed, as we think about new types of venues for popular exhibits.

For me, the project was a dream come true -- I started in the museum field a couple decades ago with a special interest in uses of technology that encourage communication across cultures.  Now I've got my radar set on projects that include international teams focusing these topics...

Twitter Experiment, Pt 2.

Some time ago I posted thoughts about potential use of Twitter in cultural exhibits (and had some good conversations with Shelley Mannion about her very interesting work with the Tibetan teens in Switzerland). The ability to quickly compare experiences among cultural groups seemed promising.

I've continued to play with Twitter, and had an interesting experience this morning when I was in Harvard Square. I posted an entry about looking at sunlight on the bricks in Harvard Square. Within an hour, I received a notice that my postings were compiled ("followed") by another user, "Harvard Square Now!". And this seemed to be a compilation of all the postings containing "Harvard Square" in the text.

That kind of automatic compilation is pretty amazing. A shared experience in a public space. I'm thinking of implications for other major cultural venues, like Ellis Island, or the Holocaust Museum, where it's likely people will be posting about their experiences regularly...

Refugee Life Exhibit

"Torn From Home," the exhibit on refugee life developed at the Lied Discovery Children's Museum, opened last week, and I'm pleased to have developed a StoryKiosk installation for this groundbreaking exhibit. Visitors experience walking through a refugee camp, and at the end they record their reflections on the experience.

It is a challenging topic: visitors generally come to museums to learn and enjoy their time together in exhibits, so an exhibit on refugee life would seem from the start to be at odds with that experience. But the exhibit manages to strike a masterful balance between providing a novel experience and introducing a topic of international concern. Families can create a shelter together: an intriguing challenge that is engaging, and at the same unsettling as you imagine families living in this structure. The display of toys created by kids in refugee camps is inspiring as you see the creativity that went into their creation and disturbing as you imagine the circumstance of the child who created the toy.

Thanks and appreciation to Stacey Mann, Elaine Bole, and the team at Lied who helped create the exhibit. More info here, and at the Website we developed for the exhibit.

 

AAM session: museum video onscreen at ATM machines

I was struck during today's presentation on "The Current State of Exhibit Media" at the AAM conference by some stunning videos from that National Palace Museum in Taiwan. Here are a couple samples below (I heard a translated version, and I think the first had to do with Buddhist text in the calligraphy as interpreted by a video artist. The second includes 3D characters that come to life from exhibits.)

These are high-end productions that would be difficult/expensive for most museums to produce. But what struck me most is that the museum is looking for wide ways of distributing the videos, from display in bus stations, on subway cars, and on ATM machines. (Yes, ATM machines -- they made arrangements with a local bank to display short excerpts as people get cash...).

Very smart -- distributing content beyond the usual screens in exhibits and on the Web. It's one of the major considerations: how else can we connect with visitors in their daily lives?

Twitter experiment: applications for cultural exhibits?

Long ago (as in 15 or more years ago), Apple Multimedia Lab did an experiment where they gave a boy (11 years old?) in a forest in Brazil (I think) an audio recording device, and asked him to record every time he had a question during the course of the day. Then they compared it with the questions that a child here in the US recorded.  Very interesting...

I remember the boy in Brazil (who lived in an interior region without much technology) asked questions like "What is the height of the highest waterfall?"  And "What is the place with the most gold?"  It really struck me how much these quick questions reflected his daily life, environment, and world view.

Twitter offers the same capability in a new way. I'm experimenting with it today, making a twitter entry (here) every time I have a question. Would be interesting to compare this with someone else who records their questions throughout the day in Twitter. How are our lives similar? And different?  Do the questions reflect this? (If anyone out there wants to try this, let me know...)