ART 215: Introduction to Museum Studies: Museum Studies Resources

Museums aim to offer engaging and memorable visitor experiences, but their visuo-centric bias can prove challenging for people both with and without sight. Audio Description was developed to convey visual information through verbal description to blind and partially sighted audiences. However, cognitive psychology suggests it could enhance memorability for sighted visitors by stimulating ‘guided looking’. In this study, three groups of participants viewed nine photographs from the Museum of London’s collections, with either no audio, a standard audio guide or an audio descriptive guide. Enjoyment and emotional responses were similar for all groups. However, one month later, audio participants recalled more photos and were more likely to have re-engaged with the collection. Crucially, audio descriptive guide participants recalled most details about the photos. This suggests that inclusive audio descriptive guides could enhance access and memorability for sighted visitors, as well as expanding crucial access provisions for blind and partially sighted people.

Museums seek to offer their visitors a rich and rewarding experience that is accessible and inclusive. Many museums rely on vision as a means of access to collections. Yet having vision does not necessarily mean that visitors are able to engage with exhibits. Audio Description (AD) has traditionally been defined as an access tool for people who are blind or partially sighted (BPS), which seeks to make visual information accessible though spoken language. However, AD could simultaneously provide ‘guided looking’ for people with sight. This interdisciplinary thesis sets out the first empirical investigation of AD in museums and its potential as inclusive design. Study 1 examines current understandings of museum AD, through an international practitioner survey. It reveals disagreement regarding whether AD should aspire to be an objective visual-verbal ‘translation’ or whether it should incorporate interpretative techniques in order to provide a rich experience. Study 2 explores the nature of the museum experience by analysing autobiographical memories for museum visits, demonstrating the importance of thoughts, feelings and personal context in museum memories and demonstrating an autobiographical memory coding model. Study 3 investigates the impact of AD on the experience, engagement and memorability of sighted participants, with AD resulting in richer memories compared to standard audio guides or minimal text interpretation. Study 4 compares sound enriched and standard AD on the experience, engagement and memorability of blind and sighted people, finding experience benefits for all and memorability benefits for BPS people. This research therefore concludes that AD should be taken out of its access ‘niche’ and considered as an inclusive interpretation tool to enhance engagement and access for all visitors. It argues further that the development of inclusive museum AD should be driven by a fuller understanding of the nature of the museum experience and its lasting impact.

The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, celebrating the opening of its new Art of the Americas Wing in the fall of 2010, replaced its fleet of audio guides with iPod Touch-based mobile guides. In addition to this new delivery platform, the MFA began producing all of its mobile tour content internally instead of relying on an outside vendor. The new MFA Guide, as it was dubbed, provides the opportunity for broad accessibility of content—options include audio description, American Sign Language, and text transcript—as well as the flexibility that comes with producing the content in-house. And because the player is an iPod Touch, it comes with the accessibility options of Apple products, among them a screen-reader and zoom capability. One of the goals of the MFA Guide was to harness technology to deliver content to the full range of viewers, from families to users of different languages to people with disabilities—all of them on the same guide, rather than, for example, having a separate device for a descriptive audio tour. Here I focus on two aspects of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston's new approach to the mobile guide: the addition of American Sign Language (ASL), and the expansion of audio description. The American Sign Language tour became the eighth non-English language in which the Collections Highlights tour is offered. (The other languages are Spanish, French, Chinese, Japanese, Italian, German, and Russian.) Over 100 stops—which are focused on treasures throughout the museum—are currently offered in ASL. Whenever a new stop is added to this tour, it is translated into the aforementioned languages, a narrator records the script, and a guide who is Deaf signs for the ASL portion

Professor Dave Gilbert of Marymount Manhattan College has had his students record their own audio guides for exhibits at the Museum of Modern Art. He discusses his students' projects.

Abstract Audio description is increasingly used by museums to improve access to their collections by visually impaired visitors. However, research in this field is still very limited. This paper aims to report on a descriptive study of artwork audio description as a modality of intersemiotic translation from images into words. A corpus comprising audio descriptive guides from art museums in the United Kingdom and the United States was compiled and analyzed following a corpus-based methodology. Existing audio descriptions of art museum exhibits were shown to comply with existing guidelines regarding the type of visual information conveyed, the level of detail offered, and the point of view used. These results are discussed in relation to the communication context to contribute to the discussion of current practices and their implications for visually impaired people’s access to visual art.

This is a personalaccount of a dedicated museum docent who lost her vision in 2007, but retainedher passion for art. For the past five years, she has been an advisor on theSeattle Art Museum’s docent committee for access. She discusses what a museumcan do to enable her to form a distinct mental image of an artwork and a deepconnection to the artist. Key words: Blind museum access, blindness, low-vision, Seattle Art Museum, verbal description of visual art, audio description

Szarkowska, Jankowska, Krejtz and Kowalski present an innovative approach towards creating accessible content following the example of a multimedia app created in the Open Art project, carried out by a consortium of partners including museums, universities, a research institute and a media access foundation. The goal of the project is to create a multimedia application guide containing accessible descriptions of selected works of Polish modern and contemporary art from the participating museums, in accordance with the principles of Universal Design. The chapter presents the concept of the app, focusing on the results of user-centred needs analysis and reception studies regarding the features of the optimum description of works of art in museums.

The debate on the social role of museums trundles along in an age where complex associations between community, collections, and cultural norms are highly contested (Silverman 3–4; Sandell, Inequality 3–23). This article questions whether, in the case of community groups whose aspirations often go unrecognised (in this case people with either blindness or low vision), there is a need to discuss and debate institutionalised approaches that often reinforce social exclusion and impede cultural access. If “access is [indeed] an entry point to experience” (Papalia), then the privileging of visual encounters in museums is clearly a barrier for people who experience sight loss or low vision (Levent and Pursley). In contrast, a multisensory aesthetic to exhibition display respects the gamut of human sensory experience (Dudley 161–63; Drobnick 268–69; Feld 184; James 136; McGlone 41–60) as do discursive gateways including “lectures, symposia, workshops, educational programs, audio guides, and websites” (Cachia). Independent access to information extends beyond Braille on toilet doors.Underpinning this article is an ongoing qualitative case study undertaken by the author involving participant observation, workshops, and interviews with eight adults who experience vision impairment. The primary research site has been the National Museum of Australia. Reflecting on the role of curators as storytellers and the historical development of museums and their practitioners as agents for social development, the article explores the opportunities latent in museum collections as they relate to community members with vision impairment. The outcomes of this investigation offer insights into emerging issues as they relate to the International Council of Museums (ICOM) definitions of the museum program.

Verbal Description is a way of using words to represent the visual world, of helping people form mental images of what they cannot see. Some museums have discovered the unexpected consequence that Verbal Description can also provide a new perspective for people with sight. The technology for delivering audio tours, whether verbally described or not, is constantly evolving. This guide offers a limited overview of the current possibilities, but most of this article is about writing Verbal Description for audio tours and for web sites.