Exploring mixed reality with the Gemäldegalerie

client: museum4punkt0 - Staatliche Museen zu Berlin

introduction

Augmented Reality in the museum setting

The Gemäldegalerie in Berlin, boasts one of the world’s leading collections of European paintings from the 13th to the 18th century. In close collaboration with Museum4punkt0— a joint-project funded by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media —we set out to explore the potential uses of Augmented Reality within the museum’s space.

The Challenge

How can mixed reality technologies improve the visitor experience at one of the most important painting galleries in Europe?

the solution

We designed a prototype featuring a variety of augmented reality overlays that allow the museum’s visitors to interact with its paintings using an iPad and headphones.

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A more intuitive tour

Museums can occasionally feel overwhelming, particularly for people who are not used to visiting them. With this in mind, we designed the app’s interface so that its users would have an easy and enjoyable time navigating it.

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Seeing art through the eyes of a curator

By focusing the iPad’s camera on specific parts of the collection, our app displays information and details that are invisible to the naked eye. Visitors can reconstruct the long-lost panels of a 16th century triptych or uncover the hidden layers of a painting using X-ray vision.

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Designed with the experts

We had the unique privilege of working closely with the curators of the Gemäldegalerie, running ideation workshops, both inside and outside of the gallery. Together we selected the paintings and details most suitable for augmented reality storytelling, and came up with “magical moments” that would surprise, inform, and delight the museum’s audience.

It is the surprise. It creates emotion and motivates younger generations to discover more.

— Museum Visitor