Miller Gallery Hybrid Exhibit
10/27/20
Pre-Project Reflection
When thinking about E Design, I get the idea that this is a novel type of design thinking due to its young history in our program. I am intrigued by Future’s thinking because of its focus on creating new spatial experience for both digital and physical environments. It makes me excited to see how E design will unfold in the future and applied to real life situations.
I decided to purchase the autobiography of Nikola Tesla because, in my mind, I see the spirit of invention with Environments Design. We have to challenge ourselves by exploring ideas that seem almost absurd and idealistic, but this open minded approach to design keeps me motivated. Hopefully reading this book can help me understand the thought processes Tesla used in his own inventions and apply those structures in my design iterations.
Exhibition Design Article
Before starting our hybrid art exhibit, we were referred to an article about museum exhibits. Here are my main takeaways:
“Most people will read the shortest paragraph first, regardless of where it is in the layout.”… “If you’re telling a story through the exhibit, you have to do it knowing that people may only experience 50 percent of the exhibit or less.”
- Ask people who are clueless about the exhibit and show them the exhibit space — see how they interact with the space
- Popular “hot spots” are within people’s sight line and usually interactive, when there are people in an area, that will attract more people to gather
- What is this exhibit about? Capture the Big Idea. It has to weave throughout the space, not just the introduction.
- Ask open ended questions to visitors and if its sort of an emotional response, you’ve made a real connection
Carnegie Museum of Art Virtual Tour
Given that I was in California for this project, I decided to use Google Maps and their website to visit the Carnegie Museum of Art. I had gone to the museum multiple times before, so I felt this online tour was underwhelming compared to its live counterpart. Nonetheless, I decided to observe how each room was set up to grasp how the designers laid out the paintings and sculpture of each section.
Looking around the museum space, I noticed that each room had a particularly unique bench. In the picture above, one room has a modern soft gray couch which reflects the contemporary aesthetics of the paintings; however the wooden bench in front is starkly different because of its rural textures surrounding a clean, white museum space. I’m even wondering if this is a sculpture instead (perhaps the label is on the other side). I’m not sure if we need to consider sitting areas for our visitors in our hybrid environment, but it is interesting to see the design choices for furniture in each exhibit space.
Artist Exhibition : Doug Aitken
The museum exhibits Doug Aitken’s twenty-four-minute video, which is a series of vignettes with wild North American migratory animals occupying vacant motel rooms. This imagery asks viewers to consider our own species infringing the natural environment for selfish gains.
I was immediately drawn by the visual elements in the video when the North American animals were gracefully inhabiting empty motel rooms. The wild animals were portrayed elegantly within the space and had a sense of stillness. At the end of the video, that stillness is disrupted when we see human made factories churning in the background.
Working with Scale — Floor Plan Exercise
In lab, we learned about the tools and methods E designers used to show a floor plan and elevation. The following images are completed plans of the Miller Gallery:
10/29/20
Artist Exhibition : Trevor Paglen
Another artist I was interested in was Trevor Paglen because of his focus on mass surveillance and data collection. His critique on our relationship with artificial intelligence is quite relevant to the context of the Miller Gallery. The Miller Gallery is part of Carnegie Mellon University, which is well known for its advancement in AI and data collection. I believe bringing Paglen’s ideas into the Miller Gallery can have a bigger impact with the students who attend our college.
He asks big questions such as:
- What is Artificial Intelligence Getting Wrong?
- What are the consequences of using thousand of pictures for an Artificial Intelligence database?
- Digital platforms like Flickr, Facebook and Instagram create an architecture to share photos that respond to the moment, but behind the scenes those images are being used to fuel powerful AI systems, and begs the question: what kind of spaces do we want to create?
His central theme of exploring artificial intelligence and uncovering the hidden forces behind our digital world is an important dialogue that should be addressed within the context of CMU.
To get started with my mood board, I compiled multiple photographs from Trevor Paglen’s work.
Paglen’s work is a study on making the invisible, visible. Most of his works use muted colors and thin lines to represent how AI graphically draws out the world we live in. Some of these lines are incredibly hard to see, especially in his cloud photographs.
MOODBOARD
When I look at Paglen’s work, I get the feeling of being surrounded by an invisible “collector”, hence the dystopian mood. I chose a dark color scheme with slivers of white light circling the viewer.
PARTI DIAGRAM
I decided to move the front desk outside of the exhibit space, so that the viewers can be fully immersed by the artist. Plus, having a welcoming presence outside the museum space may bring in visitors that may have not heard of this exhibit. I’m not sure if I can move the attendants outside the space, so that may be edited in the future.
STORYBOARD
11/03/20
Feedback from Peter
- Consider how the student employee’s would feel working at your exhibit — having the front desk outside during cold weather would not be ideal
- Your parti diagram is split into multiple zones, but there are no walls dividing those spaces; perhaps it could be one zone?
- Nice choice in having a projection shown for the work’s title, what are some other ways to show this?
- Titles can appear when viewers are around an artwork
- In the transitional space, there are multiple doors opening and closing — you could try using that as potential trigger moments
- Think about other forms of creating an environment like sound
Reflection — Considering the Internet of Things
Trevor Paglens work heavily explores AI’s ability to carefully track objects or people, so to incorporate this theme in the exhibit, I considered having an experience in which the viewers movement around the exhibit is tracked. Every time someone shifts from one section of the exhibit to the next is tracked as well as the length of time the viewers stood in one space. This information will be recorded and revealed to the visitor at the end of the tour. To make things more interesting, the exhibit would reveal information about the work of art depending on where the viewer positions themselves in the space. There would be sensors that allocate certain works of art to be revealed. This brings a dialogue similarly to Paglen to what extent AI is influencing our everyday movements and future.
Technical Diagram
The following video is a simple circuit design using Arduino to show a light turning on when an object appears near the sensor. In the context of the exhibit, the red light would be a projection of the title name of the artwork, which would appear right below the piece when a viewer walks near the art.
11/06/20
SketchUp Model
1st Iteration Physical model
11/10/20
Environments Design Reflection
The role of an environments designer is a holistic approach in design that integrate both physical and digital spaces. Designers envision systems in which objects, spaces, and people interact. In practice, designers use sketches, models, simple prototypes of circuits, renders, and design methods to find solutions in physical space. These spaces influence human behavior by the integration of digital items physical layout. Retail and service industries utilize the blending of digital experiences and physical spaces for a delightful experience for consumers. The design firm, OMBORI, works with brands such as H&M and Target to seamlessly connect in-store displays and mobile shopping experiences for a modernized connection between buyers and the brand.
On the contrary architects design the plans and construction of a building that adheres to their concepts. Their designs follow different building codes and safety regulations while constructing innovative ideas. The main role of an architect is to work in the construction industry to design new buildings and spaces in and around them. Architects draw plans of their buildings and work with contractors to carry through into the finished project.
Visualization 1
11/12/20
Final Plan
After discussing my parti diagram with Peter and receiving feedback from my peers, I decided to edit my plan to make it simpler and less messy. The hanging photographs obstructed the view for the audience, so I decided to push the photographs on the wall and implement furniture inside the exhibit.
Final Physical Model
I worked on my final model and recut new foam board that had black paper on one side of the board. I felt this board was more appropriate for my model than the completely white board, because the black color can represent the dark room that is present in the Apples to Anomaly section of the exhibit. The new model also includes the new furniture area and rearranged photographs.
11/17/20
Final Model on SketchUp
I used black tiles and white and black walls in my SketchUp model. I had initially tried to use all black walls to see how it may look once it rendered, but the exhibit room became completely dark despite having a large amount of light on the ceilings. I also added in a display panel at the front entrance, which brings more attention to the exhibit from the outside. The display panel would showcase Trevor Paglan’s interviews and bring more context to the exhibit.
Final Visualizations
11/19/20
Reflection
Overall this project was a huge learning experience. I had never used SketchUp or rendered an architectural model, so it was fun to see how these programs all worked. I really enjoyed adding in the textures to the model, because it really brought the building to life. There were a lot of challenges while I was rendering the model for the final visualizations, and at times, it was frustrating to see my program crash every time I worked on it. But despite those challenges, it felt great to see the finalized visuals, though I hope it would be less grainy next time.
Aside from the technical details, the conceptual part about this project was challenging as well. I had to figure out the right line between the artists work and the exhibit’s intention. It was important to ensure that the exhibit highlighted the artist’s work, rather than distract the audience away from it in hopes of creating an “interesting” exhibit space. I am pleased about bring the exhibit voice outside of the exhibit space by presenting a display panel along the hallway of Purnell. It makes my wonder why the school hasn’t implemented display panels more frequently throughout campus. Thinking about these possible future spaces, makes me engaged with E projects. It constantly allows us to imagine spaces that could exist in the near future.
The future motivates me. I’d like to imagine that my final results from working on a given project could bring more value to those around me. Humanity’s history of constantly improving their surroundings, brings me a lot of positive outlooks on what’s to come, and I hope to be a part of those changes.
