One of the topics that’s always interesting to reflect on: can our work in museum exhibits actually make a difference in people’s behavior?  If we checked in with visitors a month after they came to an exhibit, would they have done anything differently in their lives because of the visit? Would they have connected with neighbors, eaten a more healthy diet,  looked into a low emissions vehicle? We’re not here just to inform...

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Now that it’s out and published in the news, I’m eager to write about our project with Washington Post Magazine, setting up a popup Storykiosk installation on the National Mall with Editor Lynn Medford and staff. I don’t think anything quite like this had been done before — using a popup exhibit in a national park (or museum) to gather news media for wide-scale print and online distribution. The results? Eye-opening I...

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I’ve had a sense the last few years that museums are evolving along with technology in ways that may reach further into their local communities. I gave a presentation about this a couple weeks ago at the SEGD (Society for Experiential Graphic Design) workshop on “Exhibition and Experience Design” in DC. The main point — to challenge ourselves with a Zen koan (question to meditate on): “How do we design for a more...

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As I noted in other recent blog entries, I’ve been working with Whim Museum on St. Croix, Virgin Islands, on a community storytelling project. Our goal was to build a YouTube channel together based on their central mission: preserving the stories of people who have lived and worked on the island. And I’m happy to say we’ve surpassed expectation, with dozens of stories coming online, connecting with many themes of the...

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So I’m sitting in the buzz/afterglow of three fantastic days last week for the “Reimagining Children’s Museums” conference, sponsored by the Assoc. of Children’s Museums and hosted by Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh. What can I say? Of all the museum groups I work with, these are the people who are going to change the basic structure and way museums serve their audiences. Where to begin?  “Reimagining...

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Happy to hear our session on iPads was helpful, and thought I’d jot a few followup notes after the session.  (Session chairs: Kathy Burton Jones and Robert Wolterstorff.  Panelists: Paula Rais/Children’s Museum of New Hampshire, Viktorya Vilk/Clark Art Institute, Laurie Glover/Clark Art Institute, and myself). Notes: Think “tablet” rather than necessarily “iPad”.  Clark is using Galaxy 10″ Android...

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