"Adam, Eve and the Serpent"
Digital media guide on BYOD and supraGuide DIVA

The Bundeskunsthalle Bonn continues to expand its digital services. In addition to new formats for external communication, the museum is implementing further components of its digitisation strategy. With the newly responsive website from tonwelt, a cross-platform interpretation concept is being created for the first time that ranges from desktop to BYOD in the museum, to the media guide on tonwelt supraGuide DIVA rental devices.
 

Right in the heart of Berlin, the Hoffmann Collection has been home to one of the most important private collections in Germany for the past 20 years. The collection, which consists of international examples of 20th and 21st century art, comprises of more than 1200 works and is thus absolutely unique in Germany. Equally unique is the way in which it is presented: the works are not displayed in a traditional white cube setting but showcased in a private live/ work space environment. The rooms were made accessible to the public on personal guided tours. During this time, the spaces were regularly arranged curatorially under certain themes. In 2018, the collector Erika Hoffmann-Koenige donated a large part of the works to the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden.

With loans from the Schenkung Sammlung Hoffmann, a special exhibition has now been created at the Bundeskunsthalle Bonn. The heart of the exhibition "Adam, Eve and the Serpent" is based around four main installations which define the space. The Bonn installations are contemporary reconstructions of the historical environment in which they reside. They are set in relation to each other and presented alongside additional works from the Schenkung Sammlung Hoffmann. The Bundeskunsthalle approached us with the wish to take a further step in the digitisation of visitor tours with this project. The aim was to address as many channels of visitor communication in the museum as possible: from desktop display to bring-your-own-device (BYOD) mobile view in the museum. In addition, we also provided the supraGuide DIVA for visitors who preferred not to use their own smartphone for the tour.

Attention to design and flexibility

In addition to the technical framework conditions, extraordinary attention had to be paid to the design. In a multi-stage process, we therefore developed designs for the digital media guide and refined them in dialogue with the curators of the exhibition. The focus of the design was largely based on an aesthetic and independent appearance for the guide, not intended to be in competition with the other works present. Additionally, the design had to be fully database-compatible and responsive. Because of multilingualism and the large number of works, maintaining individual pages was out of question. We solved this task with a content management system with database connection, which can be operated on site like a classic audio guide by entering numbers, but also offers a chronological view of the exhibition exhibits. Each exhibit has its own presentation area in the form of so-called artboards, which in turn visualise the associations by means of keywords.

However, such a digital media guide lives solely from the content that is to be presented and conveyed with it. The overall assignment therefore also included a series of original sound recordings with the collector, which are assigned to the individual works as audio commentaries. We also did the English subtitling for the exhibition film.