Introduction

 

 

Museums as social structures invite people to encounter universal truths, evidence and historical traces of the past. Their role is to preserve, examine and distribute the cultural heritage. As museums have been reformed over the years so that they can be integrated to modern society, we could point out their commitment to reshape their social purpose, promoting dialogue and interaction. The museum institution is renewed through its encounter with the modern subject; yet still, there is an obsolete form of museum which seems to accumulate the historical evidence and not be able to share its content in a profound for the visitors way . Exhibits that are divided into collections chronologically or by genus are isolated from individual historical contexts, and are only characterized by their inscriptions. In this manner, the visitor is considered as a passive recipient of visual information, with no room for a critical review. While the contemporary museum seeks to be embedded to the fabric of society, but does not aim to enter into the public space, (it) proceeds to operate in its walls.

​

​

The attempt to reverse these characteristics was to be the stimulus of this thesis. The CHIMERAS thesis project is, in fact, a design experiment aimed at revising narrative frameworks and sensory experience, whilst releasing museum form from its narrowly confine. Two fundamental key objectives of this research are the (1) integration of museum experience into the city and the (2) interaction between the museum exhibits and the public.
The museum's conceptual significance has been reshaped in a way that, it constitutes a purpose to explore structures that, in addition to exhibiting its context, suggest direct communication with the public. It is about a network of museum experiences, a combination of physical and digital structures that contribute to the expansion of museum life. The CHIMERAS project does not propose a spatial design of the museum; on the contrary, it can be considered as a suggestion to engage heterogeneous urban layers creating narrative paths. The proposal stimulates a range of questions and suggests the museum as a new, open meeting point of past reminiscences and the contemporary world.

​

​

The museum network is approached as a narrative presentation. Walking through the city and receiving multiple stimuli, the visitor is required to decode the stories that are opened up, based on his/her personal and subjective processes. Thus, networks constitute a narrative of multiple interpretations.

 

 

As the visitor is no longer confined to aesthetic satisfaction, he seeks outlets of interpretative freedom and interaction with the exhibit. By means of digitization, exhibits are released from their spatial status in the museum and the user is allowed to interact with them, composing chimerical forms and associative narratives.

​

​

The city becomes an open receptor, providing new museum experience to the public. In the context of this project, we begin the research by studying the definition of a museum (physical and digital). Following the principals of Andre Malraux Imaginary Museum 1, we introduce the two basic concepts around which our proposal was initiated, the museum network and the, what we call, hyper- collection. A brief description of the proposal follows.

​

​

​

​

​

About Museums

​

The museum

The museum is an institution that cares for (conserves) a collection of artifacts and other objects of artistic, cultural, historical or scientific importance. Many public museums make these items available for public viewing through exhibits that may be permanent or temporary.2

 

The museum is a social institution for preserving human memory, progress and culture by providing immediate knowledge through the human senses. It is a permanent record that contains how people lived and what they achieved.3 The concept of the museum is translated differently depending on culture, age, social and political context. Both its conceptual approach and, its form and content vary according to the above components.

 

Michel Foucault approaches the museum as a heterotopia of time, a heterochrony.4 Time does not cease to accumulate by forming a kind of archive. The concept of time is mainly based on narrative as the time slots are eliminated. The museum is considered as a place where the present, the past and the future coexist. Museums, in the end, are places where people by interacting with presumptions, memories and artistic expressions can reflect and re-explore their personal beliefs.

​

​

The digital museum

The advent of digital design and the integration of digital technology into the museum space has resulted in the creation of new document collections, in the sense that the existing exhibition stock is being rebuilt and revived under new conditions and contexts. The digital archive is essentially a potential collection that differs from the traditional museum exhibit space. Virtual collections can replace the concept of archive as a set of tangible- historical evidence. The digital record itself is characterized by its prospective function as it supports an infinite number of possible data distributions. Therefore, the user can evaluate the digital collections on a personalized basis, filter the information he receives and experience it with a distinctiveness that contrasts with classical archiving of documents in a museum. The archiving based on time/space factors is finally abolished.5

 

 

The conversion of physical evidence into bits and the new perception and understanding of digitised material offers new perspectives for the representation of space. Τhe formation of a virtual museum is an attempt to digitally render the information of a physical museum in order to supplement, enhance or augment the museum archive. These goals are achieved through the personalisation, interactivity, user experience and richness of content that the digitized version of the museum offers. A virtual museum can be formed based on the digital archive it collects, or it may consist of digital exhibitions created by primary or secondary resources. In addition, any reference to digital online or software applications designed for the digital display needs of the museum stock (e.g. displaying digital representations of its collections or exhibits) may be considered as a virtual museum. However, we could assume that a virtual museum could potentially be any digitally created collection (such as 3D simulation of a potential museum, digital works, etc.) which does not require a spatial substance.

 

 

Augmenting museum experience through digital applications

It is to say that virtual reality indicate the need for technological development of the museum space and the need to redesign the space itself. It is the space that can signify the exhibit and is therefore a major source of reflection and inquiry for its curators. There is a new design orientation to discover which proposes a direct interface between user and exhibit.

​

In this confronting times, we must find strategies not only to preserve our heritage, but to let its stories be rediscovered and reinvented; this is both an artistic and technical challenge. 6

In the synthesis of this new treaty, Kenderdine recommends a new way of approaching the archaeological- historical past, mixing technological means with art. The use of computer programs offers a variety of new strategies for understanding the historical past. These tools facilitate both the task of decoding the evidence' s history as well as the perceptual process of a non-familiar viewer with the exhibit. The digital representation of natural landscapes, the creation of 3D models and the ability to reproduce exhibits in high resolution fill the gaps in the fragments of historical information. However, technological means alone cannot be considered sufficient to create a rich experience and new strategies for interpreting the museum evidence. It takes a connection of space with time, of past with present.

​

​

​

​

​

Networks

​

​

Reforming the institution of museums, a shift in its significance is attempted. The idea revolves around two key pillars: the museum as a network and the narrative approach of a digital hyper- collection.

 

Rethinking the museum's conceptual significance has led to the creation of new, expanding structures that, in addition to the exhibition and study of the museum collection, suggest direct communication with visitors. This new narrative proposes a museum that is not merely a collection of facts and information, but acts as a social intercessor and receptor. To this is to be added the flexible and dynamic form of the contemporary museum which cannot be delimitated spatially, as it consists of a continuous flow of digital updates. For this reason, referring to a virtual museum is to mention an entire network of partnerships with other urban layers. The museum- network is the complex of physical and non-physical networks operating simultaneously. It includes a complex of interconnected systems that extend the museum experience.

 

The conjunction of the museum's physical space to the city's network and to digital data is a phygital (physical + digital) phenomenon. The virtual museum is trying to integrate three new terms: interaction, sensory experience and personalisation.7

​

Consequently, the visitor's interest is shifted to the expanded museum' s network which includes the urban network. The museum experience is modified according to the public space, so as it addresses to all citizens.

 

Referring to the museum as a network and its relation to the public space, it is of essential importance to decompose the term city museum.

Over time, city museums have been the stewards of a city's historical heritage and memory. They housed large collections of archives related to the city' s evolution through decades and included a range of documents from artworks to audio recordings of its inhabitants. Later, a new facade of the city museum is revealed, according to which its exclusive fundamental function is being revised. The new city museum is re-examining the urban context in a creative way, allowing a narrative narration of the past and outlining future scenarios for the city. It is, therefore, a receiver of multimodal functions, including the preservation of historical memory and providing an open field of discussion. A contemporary city museum is called upon to debate the current bourgeoisie with its historical past and interact with society. This link brings new insights into how the dialogue between the community and its historical content can be achieved.

​

​

​

 

Chimeras

​

​

Chimera, chimaera, or chimaira < the hybrid creature resulting from the natural or artificial

compounding of other species, Chimera (Mythology) < a monstrous creature with parts from multiple animals 8

​

The renegotiation of museum experience focuses, alongside the museum-network, on the interaction of the public with the exhibits. The visitor is no longer confined to aesthetic satisfaction, he seeks outlets for interpretative freedom and interaction with the exhibit, wishing to revive it through a critical reinterpretation. The digitisation of exhibits makes it possible to the audience to interact with scattered information, simulating and contrasting it. The assemblage of motley museum fragments summarizes the idea of chimeras.

 

With its digital representation, each exhibit loses its dimensions and materiality, thus giving rise to the possibility of its transformation and reinterpretation. We do not consider the digital reproduction of the exhibit as a duplicate of the original, but as an independent transformation into a digital material, making the database an exhibition space rather than a repository of files. It, therefore, enables the integration of different types of information, creates a digital collage of dissimilar elements, an assembly of facts and data.

 

In conclusion, the definition of the hyper-collection is potentially found in a database that assembles unit data, digitize them by subtracting their narrative context and material dimensions. It gives users a grid of possibilities to invent different narrative paths and revivals of the exhibits. The produced patchwork of digitised exhibits are called CHIMERAS.

​

​

​

​

​

Proposal outline

 

Networks

Our field of research focuses on the city of Volos, Greece; the city's museums network was initially mapped. To the main museums network of Volos, a complementary network is added which includes all cultural sites and listed industrial buildings of the city. Therefore, unused stores are mapped and added as yet another network, aiming the expansion of museums network to the urban web. To these networks we added an urban layer which consists of the total number of the city's inactive telephone booths. At the total we deal with the following networks:

 

a| The museums network of Volos city

b| The network of city's vacant stores

c| The network of complementary buildings (network of city's complementary cultural/ industrial buildings)

d| The network of city's inactive telephone booths

​

​

The application

Additionally to these urban networks, a database of museum exhibits and information is created. A mobile application is set up that allows the user to explore this database, creating combinations of its own components and, at the same time, facilitating citizens browsing through the city's museums network, producing personalised chimeric routes.

 

​

The planning

Creating the grid of museum experiences, our design focuses on some of the networks nodes. It includes an interactive exhibition proposal at the Volos City Museum, three narrative installations at the Tsalapata Brick Museum and three exemplary exhibition design proposals for the center's vacant store network. Moreover, we intervene to the networks of complementary buildings and telephone booths aiming, in particular, at raising the public interest. The purpose of all design process is to suggest a realistic merge of partly physical and digital means which could be incorporated into the proposed networks.

 

CHIMERAS project is exploring the prospects of a direct public engagement with museums and the city itself, so that it could introduce the city's museums to its citizens and not only to its tourists. The present thesis is not aimed at presenting a universal solution to a problem, but at an experimental redefinition of the museum institution. As an open question, each and every part of the proposal and the overall outcome explores some of the prospects of the new museum vision. Our goal from the outset is to outline creative dialogues about expanding the museum experience into the contemporary era. Our vision is to identify the relationship between museum, its audience, the city and the new media art as a medium that can lend to the museum/city experience and join all these networks. Each part can operate autonomously,or be confronted and combined, so as to produce new chimeric narratives.

​