Frye Art Museum
Art Alive! Exhibit
Encouraging youth to explore
fine arts through interactive experiences.
Project Overview
Art Alive! is an interactive exhibit aimed toward children of all ages! This exhibit uses augmented physical media animation to bring art pieces to life!
Art Alive! also includes educational components, either through live demonstration by a museum staff member or in self-serve reference materials. These are intended to help grow a child’s relationship with art, regardless of their age, skill, or affinity level.
Timeline
10 weeks
My Role
Interaction Designer
Team
Petrina Chan, Vanessa Lai Chien, Hamedia Jamal, Lo Cianfone
Toolkit
Figma, Sketchup, Adobe After Effects, Premiere Pro
Problem
Children are often introduced to the arts and sciences through interactive exhibitions and activities. Although interactive museums have been around for many years, many of these focus on science and technology. Not much work has been done to make traditional fine arts more engaging and interesting for children—after all, a renaissance fresco may be a harder sell than a planetarium light show, at least for children.
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Design Goals
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Create an interactive experience to make fine arts more accessible and engaging to young audiences.
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Foster a greater connection between children and the arts.
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Leverage technology to enhance the fine arts experience.
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Facilitate a more welcoming and engaging environment and experience for visitors of all ages.
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Offer opportunities for different ages, skill level, and affinity levels with both short and long-term benefits.
Video Overview
Introduction
Why the Frye Art Museum?
The Frye focuses on painting and sculpture from the nineteenth century to the present. Youth and school programs are currently offered by the Frye, but take place as learning experiences separate from a regular museum visit that require additional registration, commitment, and fees.
Since the Frye offers several successful youth programs, there is established interest and demand for the inclusion of children in the museum experience. However, there are limited opportunities for children to engage and learn alongside their parents or guardians during a standard museum visit, meaning adult visitors may avoid bringing their children, or children who come along may often be bored and disengaged.
How does Art Alive! work and achieve these goals?
After drawing or coloring a guided picture, their work is scanned and displayed on a high-quality digital version of the museum pieces. The scanner and software will recongize pre-programmed points on the drawing paper that it will use to animate the drawing. At first, the original painting is displayed, and then one of the elements in the painting will transform into the child’s drawing, and will move about the painting in dynamic, fun, and exciting ways.
By engaging with the art in this unique way and seeing their creations interacting and melding together with the original artwork, children will discover a new connection with the fine art pieces at the museum, whether they are completely new to the world of art or already have an established relationship and interest. Since most children already enjoy coloring and/or drawing, this experience and activity appeals to their natural inclinations. By using pieces that are part of a current exhibit at the Frye, children can enjoy the same art as their adult counterparts and facilitate a holistic visit and encourage connection and conversations between children and their parents or guardians who visit the museum.
Mindsets
Mindsets are a type of persona used to better understand user needs. We developed our mindsets during observational field trips at the Frye Art Museum, Seattle Art Museum, Burke Museum, and Museum of Flight.
Storyboards
Storyboards helped our team see the mindsets 'in action.' Below are three storyboards we used that helped us design and iterate how the service and interaction could happen seamlessly.
Group Visit (Mindset 1)
A 5th grade art class visitis the Frye Museum and participates in Art Alive!The class learns about how to use anchor points and base sketching to create a figure drawing.
Experience Map
To better understand the Art Alive exhibit design, I used a 'Service Blueprint' to chart the customer journey over time. A service blueprint is a useful way of seeing time, journey, and interactions all in one place. In this project, the process is first broken up into Before Visit, During Visit, and After Visit. The 'Line of Interaction' connect the customer journeys with the physical actions that happen at each step. Additionally, the 'Line of Visibility' shows any backstage actions or support processes that customers won't be able to see.
Key Components Overview
Specialized paper: Art Alive! uses specialized drawing and coloring paper that has guides for children to follow and registration marks to correctly scan and animate their creations.
Scanner: The scanner used to process the drawings have a tray so that large batches of papers can be fed in at once and automatically scanned. The buttons are also large and child-friendly in the case that a museum staff member is not present to operate it.
Tables & chairs: Long tables that fit 6 children (3 on each side) will be used. These tables can be placed separately or adjacent to each other to create a long table, depending on group needs.
Art materials: Art materials (colored pencils, markers, crayons) will be provided at each table by the museum
Screen: Artwork will be displayed on a high resolution OLED screen. Extra screens are present in the room for additional programming or displaying previous visitor’s drawings in a virtual gallery.
Website: Children’s drawings and animations can be accessed online after their visit via the password and QR code/link on the drawing papers.
Original artwork: The original art piece that is being featured in the Art Alive! exhibit will be displayed outside the Art Alive! room for visitors to see before they enter.
Space Layout
The entrance to Art Alive! will use a wall to divide the work space from the rest of the exhibit. The original art piece will be displayed outside the room so that visitors can view the pieces and observe the Art Alive! exhibit behind the glass wall. In order to reduce disruption to the rest of the museum as much as possible, sound proofing will be applied to the room.
Inside the Art Alive! room, tables, stools, and art supplies are provided. There will be at least one museum staff present at all times to ensure order and assist visitors and run demonstrations.
Animal Culture Exhibit and Art Alive Entrance
Inside Art Alive! room
Proposed Location
Proposed Animation Design
Proposed examples of animations
Final Thoughts on Application of Exhibit
Though this experience can be adapted to different exhibits that the Frye Museum might have, we are applying it to their current exhibit, Human Nature, Animal Culture. This exhibit encourages visitors to understand our past, present, and future relationships with our fellow creatures and reevaluate the roles animals have played in our lives and includes many paintings of familiar domestic and tamed animals, such as dogs, horses, chickens, and ducks.
Since many children already enjoy and have an affinity toward animals, they may already have a greater interest in this exhibit and the pieces in it. Drawing and coloring familiar animals are common pastimes and hobbies for children, and so there may be a stronger connection to be made with the art by engaging in this familiar and enjoyable activity.
We encourage Art Alive! to be used to feature museum exhibits and pieces that feature a subject matter that may be naturally appealing to children.