Exhibition Next: The Future of Exhibition Design

2014

The exhibition design has always been -among other design disciplines -one of the most innovative field of experimentation both for languages and projects improvement. Moreover in the recent years the use of digital technologies, on one hand, and the further more active participation of the public -or, better to say, of the user -on the other hand, are making exhibition design a promising and rising laboratory of advanced innovation. This evolution is shaping itself around the co-participation and the increasing value of trivial things as fundamental presence of experience and proof deep-rooted both in the artistic experimentation and in the daily life. The public assumes consequently a dual role: viewer and witness of the revealed memory -the exhibition subjectsand subject himself of the show -due to the belonging to/of the objects and the story told in the scenical space. The paper presents a critical point of view on the mapped scenario of approaches and case studies in an increasing scale of design actions, starting from the more traditional projects to the most advanced in innovation and people involvement.

2014

This course explores a range of museological and popular cultural exhibition practices through case studies including fine arts, ethnography, (natural) history, science and technology, national, memorial and children's museums. Throughout the semester we will focus on investigating how contemporary (primarily American) museums and heritage sites have evolved from princely collections, curiosity cabinets, circuses and amusement parks. The overarching theme of the course is to trace the development of modern museological practice in relation to economic, social, technological, scientific, cultural and political changes and how these transformations affected various "cultures of display." Studying the metamorphosis of museums necessarily entails discussion of empowered public audiences, invention and discovery, education as a means to train citizens in morality and the importance of solidifying national, regional, local as well as class and ethno-cultural identities. The growth of commerce and trade in the aftermath of the first and second industrial evolutions in conjunction with widespread European colonialism resulted in new models and venues for the exhibition of new technologies, art, architecture, anthropology, history as well as living and dead human and animal remains. During the course of the semester, we will look at objects, buildings, people, animals and landscapes to think about how their contexts of display have told three-dimensional stories over the course of several centuries, drawing mainly on examples in the United States. We will examine issues such as the relationship of collections and landscapes to identity; the intersection of commerce and culture; and the influence that evolving educational and entertainment practices have had upon museological institutions. We will consider the role of museums and exhibitions in preserving a view of the past and developing an image of progress; and we will discuss how they change in response to the various contexts in which and for which they exist. The basic objectives of this course are: • To become familiar with the origins of the modern museum, from early collecting activities to the development of the museum in the 19th and 20th centuries and into the postmodern present • To explore the relationships between museums and evolutionary theory, ethnology/ethnography, anthropological theories of cultural relativism, archaeology, natural history • To investigate the cultural and political contexts of building ethnographic collections and displays; as well as the relationship between museums and imperialist/colonialist plunder • Analyzing the emergence of the museum as a focus of anthropological and theoretical inquiry and as a subject of ethnography itself • Examining the contemporary role(s) of museums, notably as the museum has become part of the culture industry (e.g., blockbuster exhibitions); political reassessments of museums' "use" and marketing in

The research explores and maps the emerging phenomena in exhibition design, assuming that architecture—as a spatial issue and technology—as tool of expansion of multimodal experiences—is giving way to more intangible assets and values to redefine its methodology and culture. That means knowledge convergence among material and digital culture, design and humanities, ux and designer intention, bottom-up and top-down approaches. This implies to open a laboratory of transition from a planning/spatial vision to a storytelling approach that reads the metanarrative of an ostensive route like a script and to elaborate the digital revolution deeply impacting on the show-machine of an exhibition bringing the mobile web in the space staged. That means to assume that people are no more passive but interact and perform their own experience, giving personal meanings and interpretative perspectives. The paper illustrates this hypothesis reviewing some emerging and outstanding case studies in the contemporary field of exhibition design to identify and infer the emerging trend in experimental and professional practices. The cultural transition suggest an evolution of the designer role, from a conceptual and projective act of ideation and reification to a directing act involving transcultural knowledge to shape a performing environment.

Curatography, 2023

And so, I was trying to ask the question again, ask it anew, as if it had not been asked before, because the language of the historian was not telling me what I needed to know…-HORTENSE SPILLERS The more possibilities are suggested, the more possibilities exist, the more possibilities are taken in by the imagination, the more the imagination's possibilities are defined, the more the possibility of more possibilities can be recognised. The possibilities of more possibilities lead to the imagination itself, immediately and to me.-Madeline Gins If you have curatorial experiences, you might be familiar with the moment when something happens in the realm of an exhibition-the moment the exhibition transcends to become more than just the sum of individual art works in a specific space or site. Exhibiting is alchemy. Alchemy of all sorts of consciousness and entities-invisible histories, memories and projections into the future that curators, artists, technicians, installers and the beholders bring in; matters, objects, both animate and inanimate; knowledge, space and environment etc.-which dissolve their boundaries and synchronise to become inseparable and indistinguishable as individual beings. In this sense, the exhibition itself is not simply exteriorised memory or experience, or a collection of art works and their contextualisation, but also a specific attentional form, into which social, psychic, collective, and technological instances of un/consciousness are capacitated and merged.

Lessons to Learn? Past Design Experiences and Contemporary Design Practices Proceedings of the ICDHS, 2020

The exhibition space of museums and art galleries has always been made up of a series of artefacts and mediation devices that are intended to better present artwork to the public. Artists, curators, architects, and designers, especially throughout the twentieth century, have proposed forms of art presentation that connected with the public and transcended the traditional canon. In this article, we intend to highlight the work of two emblematic figures of the twentieth century, El Lissitzky and Herbert Bayer, who contributed to the formation of the exhibition design discipline. We seek to review historical exhibition design projects to reflect on current practice. Bringing together common and distinct points between different periods helps to highlight the present cultural codes worked into the institutional environment of museums and art galleries.

2007

Becoming a specialized discipline, exhibition design has many types including museum design. Working on an exhibition design for a museum, graphic designer has to select the right visual elements to contact with the visitors. In the case of Exhibition design for the Museum of Mimar Kemaleddin, a multidisciplinary process can be observed as an integrated approach. Not only working with various disciplines but also creating a design system for an exhibition is the main goal of the exhibition designer. Examining the design process of the Museum Mimar Kemaleddin is an example for comprehending the complexity of an exhibition design.

Contemporary art exhibits are complex operations that offer a considerable wealth of design knowhow. The many fragile, ephemeral forms concerning them, their importance and what they were to become had already encouraged reflections upon critiques and art theory during the final three decades of the 20th century. A number of useful debates were of great use to the rethinking and reassessment of outfitting areas in order to open up essential regions. These regions were to carefully construct the story of art and critiques; a story which is placed at the crossroads of many stories like an exchange and a dialogue or like the privileged junction of a scenario related to art and its context as well as to places and names, facts and dates.