Museum to Visitors: Please Do Touch, for Scientific Purposes

Photo Credit: The Walters Art Museum, Modest Venus, or Venus Pudica, a 10.5-inch bronze statuette cast around 1500 by an anonymous Italian artist, is one of the pieces replicated for museum goers to caress for science at an exhibition in Baltimore.

Newswise — It’s the first rule at any art museum: Do not touch the artifacts. Except at this museum and at this one time.

At the “Touch and the Enjoyment of Sculpture: Exploring the Appeal of Renaissance Statuettes” exhibition — at the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore through April 15 — visitors are invited to disregard that decree and to hold, stroke and even caress the pieces.

In fact, handling the objects d’arts — replicas of famous 16th century statuettes held by the Walters — is one of the reasons for the exhibition, explains neuroscientist Steven Hsiao, a researcher at the Johns Hopkins Brain Science Institute. The institute is partnering with the Walters on the show, the fourth in a series of projects between the museum and Johns Hopkins.

“We’re challenging people to think about why physical contact with works of art can be so satisfying,” says Hsiao, whose work includes exploring many aspects of humans’ sense of touch. “In fact, as people browse the exhibition, we will be asking them to react to what they are seeing and feeling.”

The installation incorporates 12 works of art from the Walters collection, along with 22 replicas for visitors to touch and rate, providing data for ongoing research.

The project melds the research interests of Hsiao, who specializes in many facets of touch, and those of Joaneath Spicer, the Walters’ curator of Renaissance and Baroque art, who studies the Renaissance penchant for collecting and commissioning small statuettes and other luxury goods that were satisfying to touch and handle.

But the special appeal of this exhibition lies in the opportunity to join in comparative experiments with the statuettes (well, the replicas, actually).

“We’ll be asking visitors to handle them and to tell us what sculptures they prefer and to rate how they like sculptures that have been modified in their shape and texture. This exhibition allows us to dissect why some objects feel better than others” Hsiao says.

Visitors will register these preferences, and other reactions, on Apple iPads, and visitors will be able to see a dynamic display of their responses. The data will be used in Hsaio’s and Spicer’s research on tactile aesthetics. (Visitors will not be handling the original 16th century artwork; they will only be permitted to touch replica art exclusively fashioned for the show.)

The Walters Art Museum is open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Wednesdays through Sundays and is located at 600 North Charles St. in Baltimore.

Related links:
Steven Hsiao:
http://neuroscience.jhu.edu/StevenHsiao.php

The Johns Hopkins Brain Science Institute:
http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/brainscience/

The Walters Art Museum:
http://thewalters.org/eventscalendar/eventdetails.aspx?e=2207

Released: Released: 1/23/20

Source: Johns Hopkins

Related Link:

http://newswise.com/articles/museum-to-visitors-please-do-touch-for-scientific-purposes

IBM and The Metropolitan Museum of Art Collaborate to Preserve Works of Art

Meeting at the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Cloisters Museum in New York, Paolo Dionisi Vici, Associate Research Scientist in the Department of Scientific Research at The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Hendrik Hamann, Research Manager at IBM , discuss the implementation of a new environmental sensor network for buildings which will help the Cloisters Museum preserve some of the world’s great historic treasures and artwork (The Metropolitan Museum of Art/Don Pollard).

Physical Analytics Technology Can Predict Environmental Conditions within Buildings and Optimize Microclimates for Preservation of Works of Art

NEW YORK, June 9, 2011 /PRNewswire/ — IBM (NYSE: IBM) and The Metropolitan Museum of Art today announced the successful installation of a new wireless environmental sensor network at the Museum called Low-Power Mote that will help preserve the works of art in its world-renowned, encyclopedic collection.

This technology has recently been installed and is currently being tested at The Cloisters museum and gardens, the branch of the Metropolitan Museum devoted to the art and architecture of medieval Europe. Located in northern Manhattan, The Cloisters has a collection of approximately 3,000 works of art, most dating from the 12th through the 15th century, ranging from illuminated manuscripts to polychrome wood sculptures, paintings, and tapestries.

“This pilot project has the potential to become an important tool in the Metropolitan Museum’s ongoing efforts to achieve the best environmental conditions for the works of art in our care,” said Paolo Dionisi Vici, Associate Research Scientist in the Department of Scientific Research at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. “This new technology offers a real-time, detailed picture of the environment, and we are now working on an upgrade that will also monitor the actual reactions of the works of art to the environment. These developments have the potential for us to create ‘sensing environments’ for works of art that will provide constant feedback, enabling conservators, curators, and facilities experts to fine-tune their approaches to establishing and adapting as necessary the exhibition and storage conditions.”

Works of art are very sensitive to fluctuations in temperature, relative humidity, and other environmental conditions. To preserve them for posterity, the climate in the galleries is tightly controlled and sealed cases are used for the most delicate objects.

Working with experts at the Metropolitan Museum to address the complex environment associated with art conservation, scientists from IBM Research are implementing the comprehensive solution called Low-Power Mote technology. This involves time-stamped data collection through a wireless sensor network, data storage with real-time visualization, modeling, and analysis. This results in an ultra-low-power physical analytics technique that, combined with cloud computing capabilities, allows micro-environment sensing and more precise and accurate modeling.

In the initial phase, IBM has deployed 100 sensors in strategic locations in several adjacent rooms of the Museum, allowing for high-definition monitoring of the environment that captures the subtle dynamics of the space. Sensors measure temperature, humidity, air flow, contamination levels, door positions, light levels, and more. All of the data is fed into a software application where it is modeled to provide detailed real-time 3D temperature, humidity, and dew-point distributions. A distinct feature of this technology lies in its unique analytical capabilities, which leverage several physics-based models for optimum operation, and controls and make it possible to generate and visualize hydrodynamic flows in real time.

With this unique analytics technology, the Metropolitan Museum’s scientists and conservators will be able to probe localized variations in climate developing detailed microclimate maps of the galleries at The Cloisters. The measurements will also enable the Museum’s scientists to correlate the reaction of art objects to environmental changes in order to develop object-oriented tests and predictive models for art preservation more accurately. This advance, which represents a shift from monitoring the environment to creating a sensing environment, will eventually be expanded to the Museum’s main building on Fifth Avenue at 82nd Street in Manhattan as well.

SOURCE IBM Corporation
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