To Go or not to Go? A Participatory Approach to Digitally Augmenting Museum Experiences

Abstract

In this paper, we present the results of a participatory design research project conducted together with the Art and Exhibition Hall of the Federal Republic of Germany. In this collaborative design research project, we set out to create new, location-independent ways of making museums more accessible and approachable to people who would or could not otherwise attend them, in particular those of younger age groups. We present three novel approaches that integrate diverse educational and participatory concepts into the museum visit. All are based on existing technology, allowing for easy and low-cost implementation through cultural institutions. These include a new way of discovering people with whom to attend the museum, a new way of contributing remotely to a collaborative exhibit and a new way of connecting school classes to prepare jointly for a visit to the museum, including a digital co-curation process. We explain our collaborative research and design process and present the results developed in exchange with our project partners and through input from participating users. We conclude by discussing our findings and by outlining future research opportunities.