Museum and art gallery experience space characteristics: an entertaining show or a contemplative bathe?

Abstract

This paper considers some of the fi ndings of a longitudinal research project undertaken to investigate the perceptions and attitudes surrounding museum/art gallery visits and their desired characteristics. The work centred largely upon a major relaunch, design and development project of a combined museum and art gallery on the South Coast of England. Over the course of a number of years, the project broadened to allow the investigation of dimensions of the adult tourist's experience of museum and gallery visits.The desired experience in cultural presentations and visitation spaces was found to be focused upon internal selflearning through time and space consideration, involving processes of dimensional imagining, personal refl ection and heuristic self-discourse while becoming 'time and space dreamers'. An immersive, enabling and supporting environment and fl ow of differential space elements, or spacescape mix, for this experience was found to be essential for the desired outcomes.A suitable balance of different types of space was a perceived necessity of cultural visitation events for adults and groups involving adults, including a humanistic form of 'warm' space for the central desired adult object-related transformation experience, complemented by 'cool' space to allow refl ection, consideration and relaxation. Acting in a form of tourist-visitor role, visitors were found to have a desire for space to 'bathe-in' and 'soak-up' a form of experiential learning in proximity to culturally signifi cant objects, information and spaces of implied socio-cultural and local signifi cance.

Awe and Epistemology in a Science Museum

“…Maybe a complex message, or one that takes time to consider, should not be introduced while the guest is immersed in a heavy state of awe. Along the same lines, our findings provide support for making spaces of reflection available in areas that create awe, allowing guests to digest what is going on in their mind, as has been suggested by other exhibit designers (McIntyre, 2009;Skydsgaard, Møller Andersen, & King, 2016). Researchers should consider studying awe in more ecologically valid, real world environments (Anderson, 2016).…”

The Effect of Ambient Scent on the Experience of Art: Not as Good as It Smells

“…The central idea is to facilitate the immersion of visitors into an aesthetic experience (Carù & Cova, ; Csikszentmihalyi & Robinson, ; Joy & Sherry, ) in order to engage visitors and enhance their understanding of the art. Thus, art institutions are increasingly using an experiential marketing approach (Pine & Gilmore, ; Schmitt, ) in the design and management of their exhibitions (McIntyre, ). Immersive experiences can be created by encouraging visitors to interact with museum objects by reproducing “real situations” around the artworks (Hede & Thyne, ), by supporting consumers in appropriating the art contents (Carù & Cova, ), and by creating enchantment (Joy & Sherry, ) through stimulating visitors’ senses in order to immerse them into multidimensional flows.…”

“…Art institutions are also beginning to dedicate resources to enhance the environmental sensorial richness of exhibitions. The Melbourne Museum in Australia, the Kelvingrove Museum and Art gallery in Glasgow, the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh (McIntyre, ), and the Jewish Museum in Berlin are all examples of museums designed (or redesigned) to enhance sensorial stimuli in order to foster immersion. However, a deeper understanding of the link between sensory factors and art perception is needed.…”

Cultural Tourism in a Digital Era

“…This would explain why an interest in history was often seen as being different to an interest in military history in this study. Visitors to any museum need to have their interest met with accessible artefacts and interpretation in comfortable and well laid out galleries (McIntyre, 2009). These latter points can be viewed as being extrinsic factors which enable the intrinsic interest in history to be acted upon, thus combining to form a motivation to visit the museum.…”

“…In other words, "customers" are a principal factor in the success of any museum (Harrison & Shaw, 2004;McLean, 1994). In particular, museum design is being carefully considered to maximise the extrinsic factors which are an essential part of the mix designed to attract visitors (McIntyre, 2009). This is especially true of the Imperial War Museum (North) with its purpose-built, thoughtful and challenging design by the architect Daniel Libeskind which is a key part of the regeneration of Salford's docks as well as being an important museum in its own right (Blundell Jones, 2003).…”