Brief
Create a temporary (3–4 week) exhibition featuring an artist (or issue) currently on exhibit at one of the following two museums: Carnegie Museum of Natural History or the Mattress Factory. The client wants at least one piece of the artist’s work to be on display, but they also want to use digital technology to enhance the visitor’s experience in ways they are not currently doing. Consider how technology can augment content, increase learning and/or make the museum experience more interactive.
We would be designing this exhibit to be placed in Miller ICA, a small art gallery space in CMU, for the purpose of drawing visitors into our chosen client museum.
Initial Exploration
Between the two art museums, I was drawn more to the work in the Mattress Factory, especially the large installations that needed to be experienced in person for their full effect. The work that I saw online vaguely reminded me of the concept behind the Museum of Ice Cream, a series of installation-based museums that largely grew to fame through Instagram. Though I knew that the work in Mattress Factory was vastly different than in the Museum of Ice Cream, the appeal of physically being in a space and interacting with a work on a tactile level stuck with me throughout this project.
Browsing the work on the Mattress Factory website, I was most drawn to Tra Bouscaren and James Turrell for different reasons.
Choice 1: Tra Bouscaren
Tra Bouscaren lives and works in Watsonville, CA and is a practicing art professor at Florida State University. His work focuses on waste culture and the surveillance state, consisting of large rooms filled with waste materials such as scrap metal and styrofoam, on top of which dynamic projections are placed to give the feel of being watched.
Tra’s interpretation of the dumpster as a “levelling field” no matter a person’s socioeconomic status definitely struck me and helped me find meaning behind his work:
Choice 2: James Turrell
James Turrell, based in Southern California, is considered one of the pioneers of the Light and Space movement, where light itself is the work and the environment around it influences the light in certain ways. He is most known for playing with illusions using light, large skyspaces, and his magnum-opus in progress, an open air observatory in Roden Crater, Arizona:
Mattress Factory Visit + Final Direction
Torn between these two artists, I decided to visit the Mattress Factory to make a final decision. My initial impression of Tra Bouscaren’s work was greater than in just the pictures on the Mattress Factory website. When I stepped through Night Blooms, I was not only taken away with a sense of awe but also uneasiness as I heard distorted noises and surveillance footage of myself walking around.
However much I enjoyed being immersed in Tra’s work, James Turrell’s installations spoke to me on a greater level. Through pictures, none of his style seemed impressive or groundbreaking, but interacting with them in person changed my view completely. I was genuinely amazed at how works like Catso, Red, as well as Pleides manipulated light to alter my perception and take on an ethereal quality that could only be explained by seeing it firsthand. Additionally, due to how simple his work seemed at first glance, I felt like there were lots of opportunities to create interactions that could shape viewers’ experiences with the actual piece.
My visit to the Mattress Factory led me to decide on James Turrell’s work and how to enhance a viewer’s experience through interactions. In my exhibit, I would display one of his light illusions, Alta Pink (shown above).
Initial Direction
Parti Diagrams
First up was initial planning through the use of parti diagrams and moodboards to set a general direction for the exhibit. A problem I faced immediately was the physical size of Miller ICA, the proposed site of this Turrell exhibit. Miller, at its largest side, is only about 36 feet wide and 25 feet long; I would have to fit everything in a space of about two classrooms.
With the space limitations in mind I created a few rough parti diagrams to roughly place divisions in the space. I settled on a basic set of rooms: 1) a lobby with info about the exhibit as well as the Mattress Factory, 2) a room (or rooms) with interactions related to Turrell’s other works, 3) a dark room as a transition between the interactions and his actual installation, and 4) one of his smaller works.
I decided to scrap the top three partis as they did not give enough space for Turell’s work and or used space in an inefficient way (such as placing the dark room within the elevator and its lit button panel).
This left me with the following parti diagram, a one-way loop in which viewers enter a lobby, experience two interaction rooms related to Turrell’s work, then enter into a dark transition room that opens into a Turrell installation. Although this was tentatively my final layout, there were still glaring problems, such as the possibility of foot traffic hotspots and an ineffective dark room that would likely leak light.
Interaction Storyboarding
When I visited the Mattress Factory to see Turrell’s work in person, I noticed groups of people navigating the dark transition hallways with their phone flashlights turned on. This wasn’t just a one and done issue, though, I found various videos of people touring the Mattress Factory, in which they too turn on their flashlights to navigate the dark hallways. Obviously, this overpowers Turrell’s work itself which is much more dimly lit.
It was observing this happen that inspired some ideas for interactions. James Turrell’s work, at first glance, is extremely simple, but this presents a unique problem: without knowing that dark hallways add to the experience of seeing the work, they might try to light the exhibit up themselves, in turn diminishing the mystery within his installations.
I storyboarded a few rough interactions (see the scan above):
Interaction 1 (first row):
A viewer would walk into this room, which would focus on Turrell’s life and Roden Crater, his well known, ongoing project. This room would have panels depicting Turrell’s life light up in sequence, directing the user through the room. The goal of this interaction would be to help a viewer understand Turrell’s inspirations and the meaning behind his work.
Interaction 2 (second and third row and picture above):
A viewer walks into this room which start off with ample lighting. Etched glass panes would hang from the walls, with one wall having a lightbox where these etched panes could be placed. When a viewer places a pane in the lightbox, the room would dim to black and activate the lightbox, creating an illusion of being at the work itself. The goal of this interaction would be to demonstrate to a viewer that Turrell’s works are best viewed in the dark.
Mood boards
After storyboarding the interactions and flow of viewers around my exhibit, I moved to creating a mood board to guide the aesthetic that I wanted to incorporate. As of this point, I was deciding between two mood boards: The left, which was a bit more neutral and professional feeling, or the right, which took on a royal and upscale atmosphere.
Reflection
What other types of environments are becoming hybrid? Give at least one specific example and note whether or not you think the hybridization of the environment improves the user experience.
Over the past 10 years, car interiors have dramatically hybridized and are continuing to do so faster than ever. Cars used to be a separate unit from other environments: in other words, a car’s infotainment system was connected to the car only and served only the purpose of a radio or media player, with the only hybrid element being the ability to connect a cell phone via an aux cable. Nowadays, smartphone connectivity to cars’ infotainment has progressed with the introduction of Apple Carplay and Android Auto, services that allow a car to become an extension of your phone. Additionally, new elements of immersion are finding their ways into cars, such as climate and infotainment controls being removed from physical knobs and placed on large touchscreens instead.
Although hybridizing car interiors in this way seems promising, the context of driving brings into question when hybridization could go too far. As an example, on certain 2018 and 2019 models, Honda switched climate controls from physical buttons and knobs to a haptic feedback touchscreen. After complaints by new drivers that the touchscreen was much harder to use while driving, they switched back to physical controls for the next model year. Hybridization of spaces seems to depend heavily on the purpose of the space, and definitely is not always the way to approach environment design.
Mid-Stage Refinement
Interaction 1: Lightbox
When asking the professors and TAs about my lightbox interaction, they liked the idea but felt it was missing substance. Thinking about the concept, I started to question it myself: if the only purpose of my interaction was to inform a viewer of how to view Turrell’s work, couldn’t an attendant replace this interaction with the same effect?
I wondered if sound could elevate the lightbox concept any further. While thinking about this idea I stumbled on a video of Turrell explaining his Roden Crater:
What if along with dimming the lights and turning on a lightbox, a soundbyte of Turrell explaining his work was also played? It would add a dimension to the interaction and prime a viewer with a starting point to derive meaning out of his work.
I prototyped this interaction out with littleBits, a system of modular, rapid circuit building (note: this prototype is triggered by the lights dimming, but in reality would be triggered by a magnetic switch when a glass pane would be placed onto the lightbox):
Interaction 2: Frame
For my other interaction, I wanted to convey a slightly different aspect of Turrell’s work, which was his driving idea that light itself could be used as the main focus in an artwork. This interaction would focus on only one of his works, Roden Crater, as compared to Interaction 1 that showcased multiple artworks.
Parti Diagram
The flow of people around my space was still a big issue at this point. A one way loop around the exhibit would mean that people would bottleneck at doorways and hallways (which would detract from a viewer’s experience if they ran into someone else when entering an artwork). I decided to create a few partis that allowed viewers to pick a path to alleviate this issue:
Still, with most of these partis, the experience of depriving your senses through a dark hallway was lost and the bottleneck at the artwork itself continued to be a problem.
My final parti solved both the bottlenecking issue and dark hallways through the use of a holding room. In this layout, a viewer chooses which interaction they want to see, and their impression of the installation is influenced by only the interaction they saw beforehand. This preserves the mystery of Turrell’s work by only revealing a small part of the meaning behind it, leaving viewers to view the artwork and other interaction to complete the story.
Digital and Scale Model
Since I now had a more concrete direction after finalizing the parti diagram and floorplan, I started making a digital model as well as a physical in Sketchup:
On my physical model, I experimented with various colors for the different interaction rooms based on my moodboard:
Reflection
How is the role of an architect and an environments designer different? Be specific when talking about projects, skillsets, tools, approaches, etc.
An architect and an environment designer, from my very limited experience with either, seem to be to two sides of the same coin. I think of an architect as the pragmatic one, who has to think about if a building or space is physically feasible based on physics, building regulations, etc. They lay out blank canvases of space for interior and environments designers to work magic on. However, I might (and probably am) wrong that an architect only designs buildings and rooms without thought to interiors.
An environments designer, on the other hand, focuses more about human interaction within a space; “environments”, to an environments designer, is an all encompassing term that extends beyond physical spaces to digital mediums and other methods of conveying a space, incorporating new elements such as sound and detection of humans to add new dimensions to a place. I wonder if architecture has also followed this path and branched out into further exploration so they can communicate with enviornmental designers and vice versa.
Late Stage Refinement
Finalizing Framing Interaction
At this point, my framing interaction was nearly done, however I still needed to adjust surrounding elements to enhance it and place it in an optimal location. Originally, the screens would be placed in the corner at the dividing wall (see picture) in order to prevent light from bleeding into the dark hallways, but I realized that It would break immersion by giving a viewer a clear view of the lobby when standing far enough from the screens. Therefore, I moved the interaction to a corner with more wall space.
Additionally, the surrounding walls would be a gradient sky blue to imitate a sky and keep the theme of Turrell’s flat colors and gradients. However, I tried replacing these walls with an actual landscape and the framing effect became much more apparent:
The last thing I needed to sort out was colors and materials for each room.
I kept the lobby dark concrete with a bright front desk to cue viewers to interact with the front attendant before going through the exhibit to clear up any confusion.
The lightbox and framing room shared a light cream color from my moodboard; I picked it so that text could contrast well and that it was a nice neutral base to complement other colors in the room (especially in a dimmer setting such as in the lightbox room).
I also finished up the scale model and simulated how the actual exhibit would be lit. This helped inform me about how to go about visualizing the space using my Sketchup model:
Elevation Views:
Sketchup Visualizations
Self-Reflection
What motivates you?
The start of a project is always a rush for me. It’s a great feeling to be able to look at a new beginning with fresh eyes and imagining how far I can push my ideas. There are many times I can picture a beautiful final result in my head and I’m eager to know how to get there.
What distracts you?
There often comes a time where I’ve made considerable progress on something I’m passionate about, but then I think of how much more I’m going to have to do to get it to where I want it. When my confidence in my own abilities fades, so does my ability to get things the way I want. This feedback loop is often hard to dig myself out of, especially when a small problem or issue takes me much longer to sort out than expected.
What keeps you engaged?
Seeing my classmates’ work and talking to them about environment design on a holistic level is a fresh breath of air. It’s nice to step back from your work and dream and think big without having to act on it. Seeing how professional designers are incorporating new media and technique into environments is also inspiring and leads me to picture what this field will transform into in the span of a few years.
