Drawing from the Earth: Exploring Participatory Experiences at the Museum of Northwest Art

Abstract

Art museums struggle with being welcoming and participatory spaces. Younger generations have lower visitation rates to art museums compared to older generations, and limitations on group social behavior and active participation seem to be barriers to attendance. The purpose of this project was to design a participatory on-site art museum experience. This experience was developed at the Museum of Northwest Art (MoNA) for its exhibit titled A Precarious Edge. There were three main goals of this project: (1) to create a customized experience, (2) to enhance information flow, and (3) to create a social experience. This project can serve as a learning example for museums that want to increase engagement. It also provided MoNA an opportunity to experiment with a way to draw in a younger demographic as both activities were designed centering local high school voices. This project involved conducting a front-end evaluation, analyzing the results to develop the participatory experiences, implementing them during MoNA's Earth Day event, and reflecting on visitor and artist feedback. The project resulted in a product brief that described the design process from the beginning, including a brief front-end evaluation report, the project plan and components for both activities, the Earth Day event at MoNA and the visitor response, and the implications of this work. There were three main implications for this project: (1) museums can use front-end evaluation to identify visitor needs, (2) museums can use collaborative artwork to create connections between visitors, and (3) museums can use social media to connect with visitors even after their visit.