'David Bowie is' | Questioning sound tech's intervention

Last Friday I went to the V&A's blockbuster exhibition 'David Bowie is'. This post notes how I found the viewing experience different/interrupted, as a result of the designed sound experience. Perhaps reflective of David Bowie's musical output, sound played a large role in the exhibition. To create this hybrid experience the V&A collaborated with sound specialists at Sennheiser, whose mission was to help the Museum 'bring together Sound and Vision' (Sennheiser, 2013).  However, where sound experience can often strengthen the relationship between visitor and exhibit (in its provision of additional content), I found that in this case it distanced my relationship with the exhibits. Whilst the content of Sennheisers sound guide was both relevant and interesting, its all-encompassing and controlled nature made it difficult to fully engage with either the sound guide OR the collection. Different to others, this audio guide is not a 'guide' at all. Instead audio info is triggered based on where the user is currently stood, removing the opportunity for viewers to navigate their own experience. Hopping around to find the right trigger spot, I began to resent the audio content for dictating my viewing experience. Overall, it seemed that the exhibition content was being relayed by too many voices (both active and contributing at the same time). Had the audio content been activated by the visitor's selection rather than triggered by their location, this may have minimised confusion between the multiple information sources, and minimised the audio guides control over the visiting experience.

This post is critical in its discussion to recognise how tech can hinder a viewing experience as much as  it can heighten it. Perhaps curating the work of a Musician/Artist whose career is multi-faceted (fashion, music, artwork, video, design etc) requires a similarly multi-faceted viewing experience. However, when introducing these new dimensions the audiences' liberty to engage with art independently should never be forgotten. 

Click here for the Sennheiser press release.

Fragments of History

The textile collections displays at the V&A....
Hello all you museum goers...I've been thinking about Textiles lately (mainly because we worked up an application for an AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Award with Temple Newsam House on textile collections...more on that soon I hope)....and thought I'd go and check out the textile displays at the V&A in London - this was not my sole purpose of visit actually...I went to see the Strawberry Hill exhibition...which is interesting, but not as interesting as it should/could have been I think?....Anyway, I was not really surprised to see that the textile collection displays were rather dark (such material is quite obviously light sensitive), but was quite surprised to see how 'dated' they are. The comparison to the new displays, such as the Medieval and Renaissance Galleries........(shown here)....are too obvious to state - (and you'll notice that textiles are on display here too.....)
However, comparing them does direct attention to something that appears (to me anyway) to be interesting....i.e. the role/nature of the 'fragment'. The majority of the textile collections are quite literally 'fragments', (displayed in mahogany frames that you need to slide out to see, but this is by the bye)....and the things in the Medieval and Renaissance galleries are also 'fragments' - but there seems to be a kind of coherence in the new galleries that's absent in the old textile displays (maybe it's just to do with narrative....?)...Anyway, I only mention this because on my way between the new Medieval and Renaissance Galleries and the Textiles Galleries I came across a display of fragments that seemed to offer a similar kind of fragmentary narrative as the textiles displays..........the Cast Court (and more especially, Trajan's Column). The Column, cut in two, displayed and displaced, just reminded me of the cut squares of textile fragments in the textile displays. You kind of understand what they are, but at the same time you don't....if you get my drift?
Anyway...food for thought?....
Mark

Fakes, Forgeries and Fear

Hello All,

I popped into the V&A last week, had a look at the new Medieval & Renaissance Galleries, which are fabulous....I'd certainly recommend them..the V&A is beginning to change quite radically I think....it's becoming much more interdisciplinary in it's presentation of objects. Maybe it could go one post-post-modern step further and ignore/disrupt historical 'periods' such as Medieval-Renaissance....(I think it's trying to do that to be fair in these new galleries...)
But anyway, the most interesting part of my visit was the 'The Metropolitan Police Service's Investigation of Fakes & Forgeries' exhibition (hardly a snappy title!)....it's very interesting actually...There used to be a rather subliminal 'fakes' display in the British Galleries, right near the end of the route, in a case with 'dealers and the museum' displays....it's curious how when the dealer makes an appearance in the biography of an object, the work 'fake' is never far behind....but anyway, I thought this new exhibition (sadly now closed I think?) articulated a similar subliminal response....here the 'fakes' are hived off, in there separate 'cage', locked away like the 'criminals' that they are....And by extension of course, the rest of the objects in the museum are not to be contaminated by these aberrant objects...I think there is a 'fear' here....don't you think?.....
Maybe a much better strategy would have been to diffuse these objects throughout the museum, and have them pop up in unexpected places (as fakes do, in real life!)...that would highlight in a much more sophisticated way the critical role that 'fakes' play in the discourse....and it would be fun.....and there's not much fun in fakes if you're a museum!
Mark

Mobile Museums

The V&A have recently published an app called Tipu's iTiger, a simulation of an object in their collection that allows a distanced psudo-interaction with it's keyboard. There's a great video the 'real' noise it makes here. I'm struggling to decide what I think about this one, perhaps it does the work of imaginative projection when handling isn't possible, but there is something odd about digital mediation and the way in which a single object is given primacy above the rest of the collection. It might be an extension of the increasing use of iPod Touches (is that the plural?!) instead of audio guides in museums and galleries, but perhaps that's another thread.