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Research activities in interaction design and HCI were widely altered by the COVID-19 pandemic, with many studies shifting online as health concerns inhibited in-person research. Tangible and collaborative activities are often used in informal learning spaces and child-computer interaction, but they are neither designed for nor easily adapted to online formats. In this case study, I present findings and reflections on my experience adapting an in-situ study of embodied, collaborative museum exhibits to a remote user study during COVID-19. I identify several considerations and notes of inspiration for researchers working on similar projects, which I hope can aid in furthering iterative design research on embodied and/or collaborative activities both during the ongoing pandemic and in other current and future contexts that require remote research or interactions. The reflections I present in this case study additionally play a role in documenting the ongoing history of interaction design as researchers adapt to the rapidly changing global circumstances caused by COVID-19. © 2023 Owner/Author.
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The Covid-19 pandemic has sparked an unprecedented public debate over socio-scientific controversies, particularly regarding vaccination and social distancing measures. Despite the potential of such subjects for developing critical thinking and a sense of citizenship, the theme of controversies is still incipient in science museums. This documentary study investigates the way three science institutions have proposed online exhibits on Covid-19 on Google Arts & Culture platform and checks their potential for favoring teaching on controversial science topics. Google Arts & Culture platform was searched for Covid-19-related keywords and the filtering of the results was based on focus and organizing institutions. Three exhibits were detected, whose analysis was submitted to an inter-rater agreement (Cohen's kappa). The results revealed the predominance of social and economic aspects that can strongly favor more scientifically progressive views of both science literacy and a socially undistorted science. On the other hand, the superficiality of political discussions on science topics, a lack of naturalization of the controversial discussions, and an excessive use of textual content were identified, thus revealing some initiatives have not explored the interactivity, multimediality, and the way dilemmas that mark the trajectory of science museums extend to online exhibits. From this perspective, we point out paths for teaching and learning socio-scientific controversies in museums.
ABSTRACT
The Covid-19 pandemic has sparked an unprecedented public debate over socio-scientific controversies, particularly regarding vaccination and social distancing measures. Despite the potential of such subjects for developing critical thinking and a sense of citizenship, the theme of controversies is still incipient in science museums. This documentary study investigates the way three science institutions have proposed online exhibits on Covid-19 on Google Arts & Culture platform and checks their potential for favoring teaching on controversial science topics. Google Arts & Culture platform was searched for Covid-19-related keywords and the filtering of the results was based on focus and organizing institutions. Three exhibits were detected, whose analysis was submitted to an inter-rater agreement (Cohen's kappa). The results revealed the predominance of social and economic aspects that can strongly favor more scientifically progressive views of both science literacy and a socially undistorted science. On the other hand, the superficiality of political discussions on science topics, a lack of naturalization of the controversial discussions, and an excessive use of textual content were identified, thus revealing some initiatives have not explored the interactivity, multimediality, and the way dilemmas that mark the trajectory of science museums extend to online exhibits. From this perspective, we point out paths for teaching and learning socio-scientific controversies in museums.
ABSTRACT
COVID-19 presented new challenges to museums in 2020 and 2021 as they were required to either temporarily close or reduce capacity and adhere to strict health and safety guidelines. These changes required finding new approaches to safely provide accessible content to visitors, as traditional solutions involve sharing objects, technologies, or gathering in groups to listen to a docent, read exhibit signage, or touch an artifact. We address this challenge using an approach we call BYOAD (Bring Your Own Accessible Device), where visitors’ personal mobile devices are used to access museum content. We believe this approach supports a more accessible and autonomous experience for visitors during social distancing and beyond. We describe our work partnering with a New York City museum to make a BYOAD web-based mobile guide that was available to all visitors and replaced their accessibility offerings. The guide features visual descriptions of artifacts, non-visual wayfinding directions to exhibitions, summaries of exhibit content in easy-to-read bullet points, open-captioned videos kept under two minutes, video transcripts, and photos with alt text. Our mobile guide launched in September 2020 and has been viewed over 9,000 times to date. We have conducted on-site observations and interviewed six members of the museums’ advisory council to understand the impact and potential for this approach. This article provides recommendations for researchers and practitioners on the design of BYOAD mobile guides, including: (1) designing accessible guides that are appropriate for cultural constraints;(2) building the guide using the web;and (3) leveraging existing technology to deepen visitors understanding of museum content.
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Exhibit Review: Kwaata-Nihtaawakihk: A Hard Birth, Winnipeg Art Gallery, 19 March - 3 September 2022 On 18 March 2022, the Winnipeg Art Gallery hosted its second-largest exhibition opening in its 110-year history, celebrating Kwaata-Nihtaawakihk: A Hard Birth. When entering the gallery, I was immediately struck by its sheer openness, along with the colourful walls which break up the space nicely and move it beyond the sterile white cube popular in many art galleries. The creator of one of my favourite pieces of the show also benefitted from the delay: renowned Metis artist Jennine Krauchi was grateful for the extra two years she had to work on a large, phenomenally beaded picture frame that showcases a prominent 1870 photo of Métis leader Louis Riel's provisional government.
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Coren reviews Sonya Clark: Tatter, Bristle, and Mend, an exhibition at the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington DC.
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[...]the book recalls the brightly colored walls and sculptural display of select artifacts from the collection in the Huntington's Becoming America exhibit.1 But the images also make a potent visual argument for the Fieldings' "eye" as collectors: A wealth of scholarship along with several museum exhibitions and catalogues have debated the continued utility of the term, while allowing for folk art's (or self-taught art's) recuperative potential to help diversify American art collections.5 This volume navigates adroitly around that contested terrain to offer an argument for the importance of everyday artifacts as sources of historic evidence and visual delight. The re-opening and re-interpretation of the now "Art of the Americas Wing" at Museum of Fine Arts Boston as well as Harvard Art Museums' re-interpretation of their American art collection by then Curator of American Art Ethan Lasser also speak to the possibilities for American art and artifacts to tell complex histories of multiple actors. 3.
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The capture and analysis of diverse data is widely recognized as being vital to the design of new products and services across the digital economy. We focus on its use to inspire the co-design of visitor experiences in museums as a distinctive case that reveals opportunities and challenges for the use of personal data. We present a portfolio of data-inspired visiting experiences that emerged from a 3-year Research Through Design process. These include the overlay of virtual models on physical exhibits, a smartphone app for creating personalized tours as gifts, visualizations of emotional responses to exhibits, and the data-driven use of ideation cards. We reflect across our portfolio to articulate the diverse ways in which data can inspire design through the use of ambiguity, visualization, and inter-personalization;how data inspire co-design through the process of co-ideation, co-creation, and co-interpretation;and how its use must negotiate the challenges of privacy, ownership, and transparency. By adopting a human perspective on data, we are able to chart out the complex and rich information that can inform design activities and contribute to datasets that can drive creativity support systems.
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The sustainability improvement of museums and exhibitions is a recent concern for multiple organisations. The application of sustainability criteria is one of the most important strategies of innovation in design activities, products, and service systems. This study analyses the sustainability of two alternatives to an itinerant cultural exhibition service. The exhibition travels to 12 destinations over 3 years and is within a space of 300 m2. In the first alternative, the contents are printed and exposed on a physical medium, and in the second, audiovisual media projects the contents on the walls. Life cycle sustainability assessment is applied to evaluate the impacts in the environmental dimension and the economic and social dimensions. The calculation of indicators, such as the greenhouse gas emissions, total costs, and working time, which are referred to each sustainability dimension, is conducted. A descriptive, comparative study was performed to identify the impact factors with a higher incidence. The results demonstrate that the audiovisual exhibition is more sustainable than the printed exhibition, with a difference of 8.7%, 7%, and 6.6% in GWP100, CE, and TW indicators, respectively.