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Half a billion years ago, the Earth was covered in ice. In the depths below live strange and bizarre life forms.
Biota-- not quite plant, not quite animal. Welcome to… The Abyssal World of the Ediacaran.
This exhibit will showcase and celebrate a time in our history not entirely shown to the world in traditional natural history museums.
With a new interactive twist on dioramas, tactile objects, and activities encouraging to play as well as learn.
It is with this hope to show the weird and wonderful world of our ancestors.
The Abyssal World of the Ediacaran was a final project from one of classes at ITP: Cabinets of Wonder in 2017. The class focused on the history of museums and on museum design. This is a very pie-in-sky style concept where we encouraged to work in theory and be more conceptual than having more practical goals in mind (Though I'm sure some of the things in here could be applied if enough research and prototyping were allowed.)
This project was one of my important steps and inspiration for my later Thesis, The Quantum Carnival.
Aesthetic & Inspiration:
Aesthetic & Inspiration:
Aesthetic inspiration and layout is heavily inspired by the American Museum of Natural History’s Milstein Hall of Ocean Life.
Which not only gives the feel of being under water but wide space, soothing colors, dim lights, and moderate ambient sounds provides as sensory friendly a space as possible.
The Edicaran was at the thaw of the Cryogenian, when the earth was mostly covered in ice. The ceiling will be a frosted white, with light playing on it to mimic the look of being beneath ice. The dark blue walls will mimic the deep sea, where these creatures lived.
The color scheme will try to keep with the cool colors, blues, greys, black with brown accents to keep that cool, fossil inspired aesthetic.
The activity tables and bar tops of the Specimen Retrieval Center will be lit up with LEDs under a frosted glass or polycarbonate surface.
The floors will be dark grey linoleum or similar material to mimic the sea bed or rock bed the fossils came from.
Layout:
Layout:
There will be two floors. You enter at the top. Horseshoe shaped, the top will have four diorama screens.
At the end of each “prong” will be graduated ramps to allow wheelchair access as well as normal foot traffic.
When idle, the screens would look like walls with fossils embedded in them and a placard like a traditional diorama or aquarium display.
But when you approach it, the wall disappears, revealing an animated diorama like a living aquarium tank. Touching the screen may cause creatures to scatter away or curiously hover by the finger.
Audio description and verbal description of each specimen will also play. However, to minimize overstimulation with audio, I would put forward to resolve this with a complimentary audio tour for visitors with visual impairments, or perhaps some RFID card that will only activate when near the screen. This might also need some other means of wayfinding as well.
A two story replica of the fossil bed will be displayed, welcoming visitors to touch and explore on the lower level. The top simply is for aesthetic purposes, the bottom half will only be the one that is tactile.
On each side wall will be three more screens, six in all that allow you to explore the tree of life and see just how far related we are to the biota.
If curiosity is piqued, one can compare and contrast to other recent common ancestors, or even other lifeforms. Captions could be possible, but audio or means for visitors with visual impairments would need further investigation.
A large screen opposite is displaying an overview video describing the world of the Edicaran and comparing and contrasting it to modern Earth. Audio and captions will be displayed.
Large scale plush mats and a puzzle in the shape of dickinsonia will be there for visitors to further touch and explore.
Couches to sit will be provided and tables with glowing surfaces and chairs will be provided for the activity area, welcoming visitors to examine their specimen (more infor below), and perhaps providing coloring/activity sheets as well.
In the center lies the Specimen Retrieval Center. Visitors will be given the chance to get a Cryotube. These will work similar to blind boxes or gachapon, where fossil specimen is completely randomized-- or at least unknown until you open the box. They are encouraged to open it up and play with it in the activity center facing the large screen.
Visitors will be allowed to keep this as a souvenir.
Explainers will be there to provide the specimen, but explain things further. And to assist visitors with impairments.
There would also be a space where be tactile representations of all the life forms on display, for those without Crytotubes to explore the specimens tactilely with the Explainer. My concern is due to their body plans, how to differentiate for those who might have visual impairments.
Once you have all the new information (and cool toy), you may now go back to explore the dioramas with new eyes as you exit, as you will exit where you began.
As you come back into the light, it is with some hope victors leave with some better understanding of a little known world, and the curiosity to explore more about it.
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