Beyond the Museum

Analysis

by Tereza Chanaki, December 2022

In general, the digital exhibition experience that the Metropolitan Museum of Art has to offer is rich, educational, and multifaceted. The heavy use of audio-visual content, the inclusion of transcripts, and high-quality interactive images make the collection accessible to a wide variety of people, including people with physical limitations and students from all around the world. This page will analyze the details within the Met website and the museum’s Google Arts and Culture page.

To begin with, in exploring the temporary exhibition page it is important to point out some clear inconsistencies between exhibitions. As mentioned on the description page, the current Tudors exhibition is filled with extra digital content, behind-the-scenes, and featured media. These are all very helpful resources that cover a wide range of topics and potential interests that would not be addressed within the physical exhibition. Similarly, the current Cubism exhibition and Fictions of Emancipation exhibition include an exhaustive visitor guide with in-depth discussions on the topic, highlights and long-form videos. However, browsing through the Hear Me Now exhibition and Kimono Style exhibition seemingly have a lot less digital content compared to the other two current exhibitions. Of course, these are handpicked examples and there are many more ongoing exhibitions, though an inconsistency is evident. It is understandable though that some exhibitions are bigger projects than others, though one cannot help but notice that the Met prioritizes certain exhibitions over others.

Simiultaniously, offering the overviews and highlights from past exhibitions is also very helpful. This archive goes as far back as 1999, and though it offers far less information than the more recent exhibitions, it marks the exhibition in time and allows a user to explore past trends, interpretations and museum choices.

The quantity and quality of digital information a visitor gets access to highly depends on the exhibition they choose to explore.

At the same time, the digital content on the permanent collection is eveen richer. Even though there is also some inconsistency in the amount of content and metadata available, the set up of the website is such that one can find broad and diverse information on objects, departments and artists. The variety of this material creates a very friendly environment for audiences with interests from art history and history to contemporary art practices. Moreover all videos and all audio is accompanied by either captions or transcripts which is a great policy to follow when it comes to making digital content accessible to people who are hard of hearing or visually impaired.

Similarly, looking into the Read, Watch, Listen page, the variety of themes and perspectives exposes a well-thought-out and organized section of the website. I think it is important to highlight the interactive activities that the Met has built that allow users to digitally “handle” objects, zoom in and learn details otherwise inaccessible to them. Unfortunately though, I could not find any way to access an audio of this content embedded on the page.

Even though the density of the information and content available can be very intimidating if you’re simply aimlessly exploring, if a user is doing targetted research, they will be able to receive diverse and well-rounded information and metadata. The Met’s website has done a successful job with the tagging and connecting of items, exhibitions, articles, podcasts, videos etc., and thus provides a very in-depth and engaging digital experience.

The Met’s Google Arts and Culture page, is perhaps less reliable and diverse compared to their website. On one hand, the use of high quality images, that allow for just as high quality zooming, offer metadata that would be particularly helpful in an educational setting. Interestingly, after choosing the item you wish to explore, there are options to view this item both in augmented reality (AR) and within “street view”. It is important to mention though that the AR requires a personal smartphone and a separate application. This is understandable, however when someone is exploring from home there is a high chance they are using their laptop, or that they do not want to add an application on their phone. The “street view” option takes the user’s into a Google Maps-style street view of the gallery itself. This is a great resource for people who for either physical impairments of geogrpahical differences cannot access the museum. However, one needs to mention that this components looks particularly outdated. Of course, this does not interfere with the educational element of the expereience, though it feels neglectful from a design and maintenance perspective. These two interactive elements are not available for all items, though they can be found for the majority of the paintings in the collection.

Finally, the 38 “stories” of online exhibitions are particularly intriguing. They are specialized projects on very niche topics like Coco Channel’s Modernism or Symbols within Vermeer’s piantings, and allow for an expert in-depth analysis of the themes. This is also seemingly additional content that cannot be found elsewhere, making it an exclusive digital experience. A great example of this component is the online exhibition of the Afrofuturist Period Room which can be found in the museum building. This is a very unique exhibition that deserves the detailed description and analysis of such a highlight. However, it is worth mentioning that none of these highlights are accompanied by either an audio or captions for their embedded videos, making them inaccessible to some.

It is disappointing to see that these Google Arts and Culture elements are not marketed or even mentioned on the Met’s website.

Overall, the Met’s digital experience is of just as high a standard as a user would expect. Eve though there are some inconsistencies in content quantity between exhibitions and departments, and some components are outdated, exhibition and artefact information is easily available and easy to explore. Whether one is looking out of curiosity, leisure or for educational or reserach purposes, the Met digital resources will provide a multi-faceted, audio-visual experience that will most likely offer the user what they were looking for.