Break This Glass Some Suggested Changes to the African and Asian Mammal Halls at The American Museum

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Break This GlassSome Suggested Changes to the
African and Asian Mammal Halls atThe American
Museum of Natural History in New York

• Cabinets of Wonder Final Assignment
• Jack Chang and Christina Goodness

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Which Museum Exactly are We Talking About?

• Is the AMNH a collection of things past?
• Is the AMNH a collection of things present?

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Which Museum Exactly are We Talking About?

• Is education the primary mission of the AMNH?
• Who are the paying customers?

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Which Museum Exactly are We Talking About?

• Are humans part of natural history?

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Which Museum Exactly are We Talking About?

• When should a display be real?
• Is the artful display important?
• Is mention of time important?

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Which Museum Exactly are We Talking About?

• If its a collection of things past, then no
  current information needs to be displayed
• If its a collection of things present, then
  there is an opportunity to introduce systems to
  the museum which could make data very immediate
  and current

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Design Assumptions
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A Side Note

• The interpretation of current human history is
  too big of a topic to discuss within the context
  of this project
• It remains to be decided whether and how current
  human history even belongs in a museum of natural
  history

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The Main Challenge Right Now

• Particular sections of the AMNH are
  under-appreciated, under-trafficked and are due
  for re-thinking
• The African and Asian Mammals Halls fall in this
  group
• There is great potential for positive change there

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The Mammals Halls A Review

• African Mammals Hall is beautiful, timeless,
  dead, mausoleum-like and totally integrated in
  the building structure, which is high value real
  estate
• Asian Mammals is similar but in disrepair
• Both Halls are classical glassed-in dioramas,
  populated by stuffed animals
• The art direction level is high
• There is a sense of idealism in the displayed
  environments

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African Mammals Hall Current

• The Hall is old, cold, marble, quiet, the
  cabinets dedicated to single animals. Low
  traffic, very quiet inside, nothing moves.
  Animals are set up very artistically, with a
  small part of their natural environment enclosed
  in a glass box. Very small printed text appears
  on a card to the side and their names and
  likenesses are inscripted above and below the
  windows in beautiful bronze base-relief
  sculptures. The information seems not very
  current and the habitats displayed seem very
  idealized and from the past.

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Asian Mammals Hall Current

• Current Situation
• Very similar to African Mammal Hall, but
  physically worse badly kept up, looks ignored
  and dingy. The tiles on the floor are coming up.

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Mammals Halls The Solution

• Renovation of both Mammals Halls
• Integration of current scientific information
  and/or sense of living process
• 3 levels of potential solutions
• Low-cost solution Breathe Life into the Artful
  Display
• Moderate solution The Database-Driven Museum
• Expensive solution The Museum of Cyclical Life

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The Low Cost SolutionBreathe Life into the
Artful Display
Video of environmental background

• Add movement by using video projections on the
  back of each glass cabinet
• Add audio recordings of environmental sounds
• Add display at entrances for further research and
  places on website to visit to learn more
• Add table space for teachers or museum guides to
  conduct activities with children or for
  storytellers to sit with visitors.

more information
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desktop
entrance
entrance
more information
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Moderate Cost Solution The Database-Driven
Museum

• Modular panels in dead space and low-level tables
  in front of glass cabinets
• Panels have embedded computer displays connected
  to a database driven publishing system that
  allows curators to update information in easy to
  use templates on the fly
• Panels can display network-available information
  such as weather or metaphorical representations
  of data like warfare, disease.
• Panels incorporate human knowledge of animals
  folklore and ways humans have understood the
  animals besides species and kill date
• Panels have other interactive elements such as
  sound recordings, bas-reliefs of paw prints, etc.
• Elements from Solution 1 would also be included.
• Structural integrity of room perfectly retained

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Break the Glass

• To really get at a potential way forward to those
  larger questions, we need to break the glass.

help me get out of here, theres a poacher on my
ass
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High Cost Solution The Museum of Cyclical Life

• Floor plan is redesigned divided into
  continental ecosystem zones
• Each ecosystem zone shows animals that live in it
  and how they relate to other animals, humans,
  weather and geographical elements
• Each ecosystem shows freestanding animals,
  representative plants, and animals at different
  stages of life.
• The small rooms are dedicated to elements special
  to the animals within that ecosystem in their
  lifecycle (Cave where a lion gives birth, etc.)
  Visitors can walk into the rooms, breaking
  through the glass
• Database-driven applications embedded throughout
  room, along with other interactive elements.
  (Solutions 1 and 2)
• Integrity of floor plan redesigned and stair
  added, but with small rooms off main room
  retained.
• Total experience is designed to be immersive,
  with the visitor journeying through space as a
  walker might journey through the wilderness with
  different fellow humans as guides.

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The Solutions And What They Address

• Isolated animal specimens reveal little about
  natural systems We place the animals within
  representations of the natural systems that they
  survive in.
• Lack of current information presents false ideal
  of environment in which animals live We aim to
  present at least some information about the
  current state of shrinking environments.
• Lack of human-related information
  decontextualizes animals, as if humans were not
  part of the natural cycle Human act as narrators
  to the experience, explicitly describing their
  relationship to the animals and natural elements.
• Spooky haunted dead feeling We aim to add moving
  elements, towards the aim of suggesting a depth
  of knowledge about the subject and an breadth of
  observable facts about the environments.

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Big Questions

• Thank you
• And now for discussion..