2005-07-12

Accounting for New Technology in Museum Exhibitions

Museums of fine and decorative art are increasingly introducing computer-based interpretation devices such as Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) and information kiosks into their exhibitions. Museum managers hope that such new technology will help raise visitor numbers, attract new audiences and enhance visitors experience of exhibits.

Yet we know little about whether museums' investment in digital resources is "paying off". Conventional accounting methods and techniques largely assess whether investment in exhibitions leads to higher visitor numbers and increased revenue, but ignore the museum's agenda and mission. Studies of visitor behaviour and learning focus on whether visitors attend exhibitions but largely lack methods to examine the quality of the museum experience.

This paper is intended to contribute to debates about the adequacy of methods favoured in financial accounting and visitor studies to assess investment in new technology in museum exhibitions. It draws on two cases to explore how PDAs and information kiosks influence the ways in which visitors examine and experience exhibits. The findings are used to assess the deployment of new technology in exhibitions, to provide practical information for managers and designers who plan and develop such technologies for art museums, and to show how ethnographic and video-based methods can contribute to current practice in museum accounting.

source: http://www.hec.ca/ijam/732.htm

an article by Dirk vom Lehn & Christian Heath in: International Journal of Arts Management (Spring 2005)