Harlem Gallery of Science: Video games exhibition
The exhibition Video Games: The Great Connector is an immersive experience that aims to inspire youth and adults to explore academic and career opportunities in New York City’s dynamic digital gaming industry. The goal is to break away from the perception of video games as a non-productive use of time and instead show how games teach and connect their users and that a prosperous industry behind them merits attention.
The exhibit is organized into three sections:
CONNECTING WITH SELF section of the exhibition invites visitors to actively explore how games develop skills that shape their identity and manage their emotions, fostering a sense of active participation and engagement.
CONNECTING WITH COMMUNITY section of the exhibition lets visitors investigate how games foster community and broaden awareness of the world.
CONNECTING WITH FUTURE section of the exhibition is a gateway for visitors to explore the diverse and promising career paths in the gaming industry, inspiring them with the real-world relevance and potential of this dynamic field.
The design goal of the exhibition was to create an engaging and immersive digital environment. With that purpose, we maximized the size of the digital media to the extent that the budget permitted and fostered a studio/lab atmosphere that befitted a minimal build-out. We also designed with a sustainable goal in mind by employing reusable elements and thus provided the client with exhibit equipment to be used in the future.
The Harlem Gallery of Science produced the exhibition.
Exhibit Design: Museum Environments with the assistance of Marlyka Williams.
Curators: Barry Joseph, Nick Martinez, and Ashlyn Sparrow
Graphic Production and Installation: Color X
Audio Visual Installation: Chris Rice
Location: Harlem School of the Arts
The design provides the largest projections possible and concurrently allows easy packing and reinstallation at another site.
This exhibition was developed in close collaboration with three groups of advisories. One was a Youth Advisory composed of New York City teenagers. The second was a Community Leaders Advisory composed of individuals from learning institutions in and around Harlem. The third was a Games Expert Advisory composed of game designers, academics and others promoting the pro-social use of digital games in NYC
< The "Youth Advisory" from Harlem volunteered images of their avatars.
Knowing Nature: Stories of the Boreal Forest
Museum Environment (ME) assisted Smithsonian Institutions Traveling Exhibition Services with the design of an in-progress project. We quickly adapted our design contributions to the existing exhibit goals. Our solution focused on reducing means of production to make the project feasible and, in turn, more sustainable. We avoided plastics by using direct-to-medium printing. This method provided a graphic look aligned with the exhibit's message of an ecologically sound future.
Knowing Nature weaves together themes of climate change, Indigenous perspectives, and the relationship between people and nature while taking audiences on a learning journey that starts with curiosity, builds empathy, and leads to action. Visitors will experience the sights, sounds, and textures of the boreal forest within the exhibition's immersive experience while also hearing firsthand from the Indigenous peoples of the boreal how knowing nature can offer a vision for a sustainable future. Knowing Nature offers stories of resilience, strength, and hope in a changing world.
- 2,000 square feet, turnkey exhibition including all hardware and media software
- 6 free-standing graphic structures
- 21 graphic wall panels
- 11 objects including scientific materials and Indigenous artworks
Exhibit Producer: Smithsonian Exhibits
Curators: SITES
Central module with an immersive boreal forest experience in its interior. Hidden speakers provide a soundscape with sounds from the forest. The goal was to create a multigenerational interactives and touchable objects
Museum of Chinese in America/Food Exhibit
Sour, Sweet, Bitter, Spicy; Stories of Chinese Food and Identity in America weaves together complex stories through a dynamic video installation featuring pioneering chefs, and banquet setting created but notable contemporary Chinese-American ceramist. Museum Environments worked with curator Herb Tam and exhibit developer Andrew Rabatta to produce a truly innovative exhibit format. The combination of elements has a welcoming poetic effect of a grand table along with heartfelt and informative stories of food in cultural life.
Big Idea: The curator Herb Tam had the brilliant idea of creating a large banquet table and populating it with ceramics representative of the different regional Chinese cuisines. The execution of the concept followed through on the welcoming character of the big idea. The message was that regardless of your prior knowledge and cultural background your are welcomed at the table.
Engagement: An institution’s relationship with the visitor is at the core of its mission. Exhibits are conversations with the audience that forge this relationship. The design strategy for the exhibit was to provide different means of communicating the content and establishing the conversations with each other sitting at the same table.
Storytelling: The exhibit is not just about food but the stories of the chef's inspirations and challenges. Apart from the video interviews on the walls, booklets display biographical content along with a map of their journey.
Co-Creating the exhibit with artist: The ceramic food sculptures, created by artists Lu Zhang and Heidi Lau, represent a traditional Chinese banquet. In creating a visual representation of each region, the artists were strongly influenced by the area’s climate, landscape, and built environment, as well as its effects on raw ingredients and taste.
Exhibit's Graphic Identity: A consistent graphic identity was created for the exhibit throughout all communication material. We preserved the bilingual typographical lock-up at all levels of the design, from exterior banners to title walls and brochures.
Press reviews of the exhibit
The Paris Review:
The Food and Wine Magazine: http://www.foodandwine.com/blogs/museum-chinese-america-cooks-something-special
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