Art Museum Experience

While I was home I visited the Sidney Museum in Port Orchard, WA. The type of work they exhibited was the history of Port Orchard, but also paintings from artists and a little bit of jewelry. While I was there, I talked to the woman in charge and I asked her about the barn wood walls, asking why they were there and if they were moveable, they were not moveable and she said that they were placed there because they needed more wall space. The type of lighting they used at the museum was track lighting and natural light. I asked her if the natural light coming from the windows damaged the artwork at all, and she said that they windows were made out of museum glass, which lets the light in without damaging the artwork. I was directed through the exhibits but the paths between them and the track lighting guided the way, because the museum was dark other than those lights. Another thing I noticed about the museum was the materials and colors of the walls. The floor had a brownish carpet, and the walls and ceilings were white. I think those colors were chosen to not take away the beauty of the artwork. The visit to this museum really helped me to understand a gallery space a little bit better. I will definitely incorporate what I have experienced and learned into my future projects.

Impaired Vision Experience

There are many different levels of vision impairment. In this exercise I experienced eye sight through a plastic bag, a simulator tool, and glasses with a covered glaze. Before I started this exercise I did not think that I needed to experience what it would be like to be visually impaired, because I thought I could just research about them to design a living space for which they live in. In my experience with my group we learned a lot and found out that in all visually impaired situations, light is very important, because if you see a color thats dark then it looks scary, and you would not want to go to that darker area. We also learned that it is almost impossible to read small print, sometimes it is hard to recognize people, you can see contrast between colors, eyes would eventually get tired everyday, it is hard to find the bottons in an elevator, and it is easier to see shiny things. Doing this exercise gave me just a few minutes to try an understand what it would be like to have impaired vision, I still do not understand it fully. It would be extremely frustrating, and it is important for our interiors to try and eliminate some of that frustration.