Eleventh International Conference on The Inclusive Museum

Abstract

As our lives become more and more mediated by screens and technology, cultural institutions are rapidly turning to more immersive environments and experiences. Museum exhibition and curatorial teams are reconfiguring the roles within their own teams and are hiring new members with expertise in experience design to keep up with the demands of modern visitors. Large amounts of money are invested in the rethinking of exhibition galleries and museum outreach strategies. The term “immersive” has become widespread in relation to museums and is used for describing a fully spatialized embodied engagement with various environments from online to theatrical, making its meaning pervasive. This paper presents the results of two research projects which describe the main aspects of current immersive approaches in museum design. The studies were undertaken at the exhibition design company All Things Studio in London and at the School of Media and Communication of the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in Melbourne over the period of May-November 2017. Interviews with practitioners and archival research were conducted with the purpose of identifying theoretical aspects of immersion applied in practice. The findings showed that theories of immersion are not implemented in designers’ practice; however, the aspects of landscape design, choreography, game design, and UX are used to create exhibitions that are relevant to modern visitors. Moreover, we indicated that Melbourne Museum and Australian Centre for the Moving Image are restructuring their design teams with the goal to break through the established frameworks and foster experimentation in museum exhibition design.