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Audiovisual Cultures episode 11 – National Science and Media Museum automated transcript


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<Paula Blair> Hello and welcome to edition eleven of Audiovisual Cultures, the podcast exploring sound and image cultures and their many shapes, forms and varieties. I'm your host Paula Blair. This week Andrew Shail and I reflect on our visit to the National Science and Media Museum in Bradford during the Spring break in April 2018. A really big thank you to all our listeners, supporters, sharers and pledgers. To sustain and improve the podcast please consider giving a small monthly amount at patreon.com/avcultures where you can get more information about my other work including videos, blogs and publications. All support is gratefully received and helps make robust arts and humanities education widely accessible. Enjoy the discussion and I'll be back to talk to you again for a little while after. 

So it's the Spring break and we're joining you from Bradford this time. Yesterday we spent the afternoon in the Science and Media Museum.

<Andrew Shail> National Science and Media Museum.

<PB> Indeed, and what national even means, it's something that is a bit up for debate I think in this context so we'll maybe get on to that as well. We're just going to talk through a few of our experiences and what we did and some of the exhibitions and what we thought of them and stuff. 

<AS> Okay so just to provide some Shail historical nerd context, this was what was initially from when it was set up in 1983 the National Museum of Photography, Film and Television was renamed in 2006 as the National Media Museum and then it was renamed last year in 2017 as the National Science and Media Museum. I've been once before, you haven't been 

<PB> I've never been to Bradford before so I'm having a great time.

<AS> And when I went and it was shortly after it became the National Media Museum, even so it was still in a set of galleries, one about film, one about photography, one about TV. It was relatively little exhibition space and those exhibitions, I can see why they weren't deemed to be popularly attractive because clearly what's happened since is in, and part of is the change in the National Science and Media Museum, is lots of interactive exhibits. The biggest one I suppose is the Wonderlab which is the main thing you come to when you get above the temporary exhibitions on the first few floors. Everything there is interactive in some way and the whole point of I think the change to the National Science and Media Museum is that this museum is now a set of insights into the physics of perceiving media objects.

<PB> optics and aural-scapes, that kind of thing.

<AS> They had ways of showing the oddities of the way that we see the colour, had ways of illustrating how you change the wavelength of a piece of sound, for example, they had ways of illustrating how we perceive 

<PB> How light and colour works and delays when you're recording things visually or in audio and how frequencies affect whether or not we can even hear.

<AS> The sound stuff was - for two very visual people - the sound stuff we found quite intriguing, didn't we?

<PB> Really, yeah, it was great. I mean that was when we could get to it <laughing>

<AS> Yeah a big thing we ought to name; the elephant in the room was so many kids.

<PB> Well because it's the school holidays and it was fantastic, I mean they were all so excited and it was amazing to see them and it was so great to hear that little voice go 'oh this is  cool, this is the best thing ever!' you know, and really getting a lot of learning and things like that but unfortunately a lot of the kids are incredibly entitled and were literally pushing us out of the way. I got shoved off, literally shoved off things by children all day.

<AS> There was, the variety of kids, I was present at one very interesting interaction. People-watching is a whole other thing you can do at museums like this. I was present at one interaction which was a young and extremely confident girl, probably about seven I think, really well-spoken as well - I don't mean well-spoken in the sense of how politely spoken - just really confident and put together really coherent sentences, instructing these two boys who were slightly older than her how to do a thing, and they would not just listen, that was really intriguing.

<PB> Yeah really telling.

<AS> And then there was the little kid who came and sat next to us when we were playing

<PB> Prince of Persia 

<AS> on a SEGA I think it was. Oh no it was something else.

<PB> It was a Nintendo thing. It was one of the early Nintendo console games I think. My next door neighbours, the boys who lived next door to me had it and I used to watch them playing it for hours on end and I can't believe it because that was so boring yesterday! I mean it was great fun with the kid there; he made it come alive, it was amazing.

<AS> His emotional reactions to everything that we were doing 

<PB> he was really small as well, he must've been three, no older than four.

<AS> That little boy? Gauging the ages of kids: this is our superhero weakness is

<PB> they're so grown up so fast

<AS> I would say six 

<PB> really? He seemed really small.

<AS> physically yeah 

<PB> He didn't have a huge vocabulary.

<AS> Maybe five. But the parent or guardian was so funny because she was trying not to tell him off but was also mortified that he just kept grabbing the joystick off her.

<PB> but he was just like 'I'll show you how to do it!' and then he didn't have the wherewithal to do anything.

<AS> To be fair, I was probably the only one who'd actually played the game before.

<PB> I had watched it being played but I'd never used that controller before.

<AS> You see, when I played it I played on a PC so it was all keys.

<PB> The friends I watched playing it had a different controller for they didn't have one with a joystick I don't think I can't remember them having that.

<AS> and then we played a bit of Sonic the Hedgehog

<PB> Well I handed your arse to you on sonic the hedgehog.

<AS> I've never understood, I've never understood that game.

<PB> don't remember playing that one because it was races actually it was I was sonic in you were tails and we were trying to get to the end in the fastest time yeah that's that's an implied and then just the fact that I won a couple of them doesn't that we get a fax the forgotten how you daily thing for going about all the spiky things might kill you back there okay interestingly though there was a run on the game's gallery and it was hardly a an exhibition about games it was just a gathering with yeah it is a smart kids gallery scene distinction on the left console stuff which you didn't have to pay for on the right lots and lots of arcade games did have to ten twenty it was very low but there's an income stream for that right that is a free museum behind yeah yeah I have to get that money somewhere clearly there are three major revenue streams that museums tend to draw on which are the gift shop and cafe and in this case that multiple screens including I think the first time I've seen U. K. they need to much then gets or anything on top of everything and get money which brings us on to a thing which really seem to have both enjoyed the most I think so he asked and I'm going to say because it was three points first ticket yes for the first year reality and you got eight minutes and I have to say I think it was a bit stingy acted on fifteen eighty three hours ago and while on the go I think it's do this really cool thing which involves corn sophisticated virtual reality yeah yeah the three grapefruit but then I didn't realize it was going to be a mess at least so Kelly could have been there for quite a bit longer actually it was fantastic it was cool thresholds it was a virtual reality exhibition created by going with my coalition it's a combination of a virtual reality headset headphones a backpack which seems to contain lots of things including power for everything that you've gone had Anderson seems to transmit your location to the center computer which is providing you with all this information commission of all that stuff with a broom inside a room and this room is completely white if you're still looks it remembers yeah it's on and it contained rudimentary mock ups of the objects that were individually have to space so if you went and touched the table translates you feel a table the room was probably on to something like twenty feet the line yeah it was a fleet vehicle and it is time to explain what it is because it's not simply that this national science and media museum is hosting an exhibit which is about virtual reality might consider first realty from medium not something that but that the virtual reality experience was a photography exhibition yes that was seventeen thirty nine and of course calling it a photography exhibition slightly not contesting because in the time and it was an exhibition by William Henry fox Talbot at the time he called them photogenic Jordan's and I had a little tiny now when I saw that because I had a look at the book talks to look produced sharing some of his first few what we prefer to go off and the name of the book was the pen of nature so his idea is that the town he's come up with is simply something that permits light that gives light to Penn sort of like writing itself down so photogenic currency yeah as it says Jenna has literally created by a lot of money gives us photography but I come back when we were meant to protect you now imagine a set of basic optical processes very reliable technologies that we used to operate with sexuality having no idea in the group mark them for that this is a human if there's a creative role and it is the human using that in certain ways such as exploiting limited depth of field that comes with certain lenses for example where as in foxtrot this time his description of photography is something which involves creativity anyway he says no human creativity and it's the sun the times some pictures is coming back to me from the graphic novels in the eighteen nineties the sun that %HESITATION just life itself which is which has innate creativity in it because it has this in the capital of the time because it's doing something that up until that point humans have done towards left that conceptual aspect of photography including that it's not cold okay all right and so I just looked up where this virtual reality exhibition was sacked it was an expression of photographs Marijke eighty four to I also think we gotta opening cabinets and these photographs were shown as part of an art exhibit at Somerset house which is on the strand in London the building is now in lots of different things the cultural institute uses part of it king's college London music part of athletes of art institutions use lots of different parts of it that way back in the eighteen thirties when this happened it seems that the royal academy was using as well Sir it was part of a larger exhibit of drawings and paintings I like this idea that it starts off as part of something else it starts off as a kind of kinky form of something that people are already doing when it's something that's been given for the ship in this particular corner and it was at this room that was being recreated was very small group and you sort of order in the mail I don't know why well I I start to get a sense afterwards that you got more time on your VR than I had when I finished I was what you doing here yeah I think he'd go and before me because it took a while to and then I was Jennifer because that's it see if I could get my glasses under the thing and it just took a bit longer I think for me to get all the canton street and there okay Austin I lived I to come in after you I think maybe it was that I just instantly started can have sex with my own hands but I went anyway that's the looking at the photograph so having a look around the room because there's in addition to focus the room itself is fast it was added to the hands thing that was missing I was not aware of this is possible because on the front of our vocals there was a sense that rudimentary sensed what was very close friends of other races based on your own hands yeah other bodies moving around with the pair like the sort of ghostly whitish blogs and I think there's one being sent for the senses that were on the front of our local news it was just everyone backpack was transmitting a signal showing where they were working with because it wasn't over here so I like their recess talked online usually ram and you could see everybody may have been around yeah and there's one point where I could see you and we were talking as well that was the one known V. R. was that in addition to hearing stuff yeah you can also just here to the talking there's one parcel blog and I said Hey guys that you and your yeah it is and we held hands for just a moment yeah we did some stuff the person that there was no interacting with other people in front of US one point when I noticed it was about five ghosts or bunched up in Waco I thought I'm not gonna go anywhere one of them and then one of the attendants came but you'll find someone because yeah and we're like we don't know where we are but you can't see each other I think at that point I was in one of the corners but I was scared of the windows because he Katie there had windows with bars and then you can hold on to the bars and I was granted a running because you look up the sky it was night time and the receipt reading ominous cloud eights and there were people from olden day times walking around there was a point where it shows you the last night if you hear lots of noise happening they're going to windows and there was a riot happening which I don't think you so off I heard the noise of the open windows to windows and there was one person every single window ghost and everything went so far I'll just wait and then it was over yeah you could see if there is justice Kreider's people running and yelling and the repairs for exit was fired there is drunk people leveling Orion's membership chasing some but I so it's been exciting but even before and after that it was just sort of the odd person milling around on the grind it side to make Europe on like a second floor or something they've sued detailed inside as well at the hands of this really fascinating because you could see these blokes and then when you go outside of these blocks you kids call for %HESITATION for a photograph with your palm flat towards that and then you just turned your hands so late and that you could see the photograph close up it was like you have to reach it would've been something you would not have been able to do an exam you can let me just check it out for a drive out from a glass company you wouldn't know a vision you have been able to bring it up to five you can see the details and then I never really fast thinks about it %HESITATION and he needed more time because the room itself was so detailed we were in quite a small box in your inbox the virtual reality reckless here each year actually restricted it was sort of blocked off the surface cabinets either side but it expanded well beyond that space on that roof was really told us while it was so many details so the rush on the Lehrer Swiss maaf flying around at one point I could see something already tiny black scuttling around the floor and I thought maybe it's a nice but I couldn't say close enough and I said don't worry %HESITATION there's something running about on the floor thank you and one of the attendants said yes to the %HESITATION mice and if you look up at this time but there should be some off another down before I could say %HESITATION while or something like that this other woman just fine all this disgusting though come on this is really a co this is so details of people used to sanitize environment that just seeing some sort of non human life the building is disgusting I mean it it's just not even room offices virtual reality mafs author not scuffing any loss it's not like it's snails slamming on the floor there's a particular growers this party to going on to one of the portrait thanks yeah that was the one where I think what he had said you were watching me through the window and I think that was the thing is that you know where one of the ports truths for us in the wild was actually a windows the year started with painting with a spider on enough and dina people are go off and then I this is simple experiences that the first is seeing the first which often well over a century and three calls were very at an eighteen thirty nine yeah these are mostly from the museum's collections lovely stuff and even the earliest the photographs would not actually taken using a camera this is very cool stuff you know it is the naked version of the media forty people figure out constraints to put it in fox Talbot made these exposures by taking the object itself it was leaves ferns lifting and placing them on to the light sensitive paper and then exposing it to light and then coming up again and then fix it somehow and so there was no room using a camera to focus an image onto a screen through eleventh not stuff it was just putting the thing you want to take it for twelve rounds fascinating stuff so the first thing was getting to see these extraordinary breath photographs and collection the second thing was getting to see a virtual reality environment the food was experiencing this very particular source of virtual reality technology because it was we can see what you can hear a degree of interactivity and %HESITATION so your hands without having gloves on yeah the amazing you can do stuff with the hands as long as you're looking at sensors in the front of the goal and the fourth was when I'd finished standing outside through the window watching how what the people when they're in this immersive environment look and you had a smile on your face I'm with impish having a great time it was the opposite %HESITATION that's disgusting you were going this is the this is the kind of thing ever going to do this every day this is great there was a fire in the corner as well so they had to think nothing of spending heater or something and and adding hate so this really Sensirion nonsense is wild but you could see and hear this crock of angering fire and what was in the middle of this massive ram but it's in the corner in the space that you're in some houses lots of long ago because we were in a little slice of a long battery yeah this is like the middle section of a much bigger brands and that was two days to the sailing was really detailed the flower beds ready details all the cop and that signature data and you know you could touch base thank you Rachel you could touch the cabinet so the rich just painted white blades but see kids feel all different sort of corners and bum since the pets that were glass you could touch them for both your face against them I can't think of some of the clothes they some but the mask comes right so far and it's really difficult transaction are far far comes right there is still false they have the chemicals for making up the stuff so I was looking at the labels on the ball who's trying to read them to actually get concern of course is black and my face off the thing and their positive course so that was fine I was really delighted that David Feder for my glasses the person was saying that if you have read a wide thick creams it's a bit difficult %HESITATION they fit just perfectly over mine let's just pause for a moment because at that moment the image using your lesson was going to the squishy lands right on the corner which is the lands on the surface of your eye and it was originating from a screen that was a fire engine off in front of you okay that is a lots of transparency versus being roped in you saying something I think you're seeing a lot with your hands anyway so if that makes sense because you can fail to objects in the red in SharePoint and makes it so even if you can't see your hands wrapped around the bar she knows that there you could say that and it's almost as if they are there you can't see them but you know they're there because you can say that I'm thinking for a small environment when he's supposed to be interacting with lots of things without really going by just creating the environment in white painted wood is feasible with back for any bigger environment it would have to be that you create the sense of touch to having a complete skin covering six which is the ready player one there was an alternative routes to touching something in virtual reality of course there's still a few senses leftovers aren't getting the impression that you are in this virtual world and it's the smell taste sense I think that's what it can get really really impressed if you can smell yeah because they're supposed to be there having that kind of musty smell out probably would it heightened the even more if you could smell the fire but just feeling hate and hearing the crackles lo and seeing the light from a you know this was already quite a lot and this is if you can smell it and %HESITATION right because there's all these other senses are informing what it would be like well thank when you experience one since impulse and you because you're situated with another one hallucinates factor the sense of it's not proprioception as something else %HESITATION fern %HESITATION looking on three touch on some of the other things so it was just a dumb because I just think for a moment about the idea of such a reality as giving a gateway to time travel because this was set up as if it was an exhibition from almost a hundred eighty years ago this is very possible nice if he have detailed documentation of something and this was even today I mean we've got online exhibitions and things like that but if it's virtual reality can if you're somebody who can't travel say feminists or New York or wherever a massive exhibition is if you kids access a virtual reality version that would be incredible media that we see is a lot less immersive cemex have been tempted in that time as providing an opportunity for people who don't have the means or ability to travel to just do it anyway yeah that's one of the dominant discourses in the late nineteen intends about sin as technology advances and becomes more accessible than and makes it more possible that it's more might be acceptable to a wider range of people if you're somebody who you can't afford a hundred stuff pines to go to another country to see a major expansion of something that you really want to say but he can't afford your fiver to see a virtual reality version for twenty minutes or whatever it is and thirty years time fan top key treaty began to democratize he gets to access these things going from that exhibition one of the very first ever photographic exhibitions said thinking about the talk of the exhibition that's in the same at the moment it's called city girls and it's a solo exhibition of photographs taken by you tracked off center I don't know if I'm pronouncing up properly there's quite a lot of information on the museum's website Siskel city girls and that's it by the women who go to see E. Bradford which United's just transferred so they I don't know I just kept saying headlines for United's everywhere shows can make face to face even though I should note that I am going to see Bradford playing football I had some issues with it no one is safe from this talk I mean this is somebody I looked at the activation first and then I read the information about it afterwards I was going on in the exhibition and I could see this person as since trains this person is using at Grady Kate's comment on this setting up a meeting with a lot of the photographs are really well trained and they know what they're taking out and stuff but this is someone with a really good quality comment pointing and shooting on match days and that's fine but I was going awry no thinking well this is fine but I don't really care because it's simple and it doesn't actually matter the relative quite intensive images of people's faces with concern with query they were immersed in the game they had no awareness of the camera in their face that kind of thing some of those who were ready very well taken but because of what the subject matter was I couldn't muster up any emotion about it I told because I seen so many photographs taken by professionals Hey we are technically trained in war zones with people with very similar looks on their faces and they really have something to worry about it so I I find it very difficult to really care about the exhibition and then I think also because it was sort of I think presents is back as always the nice the great famine this thing all these women who also enjoy football and if the range in the diversity of them but I just kept thinking and %HESITATION these women why do you not have any better to do with your time than watching twenty all it's grown man specifically exclusively man running a bite after a bowl that's not feminist tax look up Bradford city women's football club yeah but it wasn't anything to do with them and they weren't watching but the city will know they're watching the man that's the thing it's exclusively the men's team that's a whole other saying it right well it's a homo social environment so yes it is important to point out that women know this as well but it's a very male home social environment but also it's a very %HESITATION basically heteronormative one as well because even still to be gay and mainstream football is a very difficult to base hang in twenty eighteen which is really disappointing so I couldn't really get behind any if not all just looked up new drug offenses buyer on a website called not just took me to infect born in ninety five in Rawalpindi in Pakistan have said is a self taught photographer he lives somewhere and getting on to that when I was reading all of that her bio and when I was reading that exhibition taxed after looking at the photographs this is an exhibition that was funded by arts council England I think it's amazing that they paid so much support behind someone he actually is I'm not sure and I'm saying I'm mature and the tree sense that this person is not professional is not professionally trained but it's still a really good photographer I think my issue is that just yesterday I was reading about you the other day the arts council of Northern Ireland which is has its own funding cut significantly over the last number of years and then turn is making significant cuts to the arts in north and ardent and she really important studio and gallery spaces haven't hearted off their funding this year and Belfast and I'm absolutely gutted but not PS to the %HESITATION to queen street she deals are part of the very important life flows of the arts and Belfast it's just seeing the difference that's what I'm angry about it it's amazing that in England's the arts council will support somebody from after his background and ability in Northern Ireland there's no room me to support people Hey are professionally trained and incredibly hard working artists their life they're everything they're not self taught they've done several degrees and they're working on it all the time and it's not say that an amateur isn't doing the same on their own time of course they are I'm not trying to devalue the amateur recommend saying that this is the discrepancy between the arts councils across the UK and that's the thing that bothers and upsets me a bit about that but even within the museum itself it's really fascinating to have this virtual exhibition of probably the first ever photographer in a sense and this is somebody who is a scientist I think he counts as the first of a photographer in the U. K. one of these instances yeah there's multiple people in different countries develop yeah same thing three different methods at the same time so one of the earliest what we really can I refer to as a photographer and somebody Hastings scientific experimentation and making art with that to someone who is using a device come a very long well relatively short but also along equalization and that's science where the technology does everything for you okay he can chase while I'm on base in black and white because I'd like them to look refined and I'm gonna have these different focal ranges within one MH because the camera can do a lot for me I can it's that idea of beginning of democratizing he can access the equipment to make these images so I think those side by side is really fascinating within the museum just have a look on the national science and media museum website and we didn't see either the Kodak gallery which is a permanent exhibition of the district attorney for the animation gallery which is a prominent history of animation we also missed just five five minutes the age of animation so well because we were in a very important meeting with this young person who is showing us how to play prince of Persia making get away but we did a lot less with its reasons to try and come back at some other point we did see the television stuff we saw quite a bit of a television exhibition and I had quite a mixed response to as well I mean that was one of the points throughout his questioning what what does it mean by national museum here because from what I can say it was all English and American so is it national in terms of this is where the UK's stuff is %HESITATION highest person national terms if this is England's surfacing in this nation rather than U. K. as the American obviously is because we are still a few days to a dominant American culture I was there to think in those sorts of things expose at the British Museum everything's appropriated from elsewhere and inspect colonization more than anything else but it was ex facie being actually find that disappointing that there was no basically eight Wales Scotland and Northern Ireland didn't exist in this museum that means and it's called the national museum it feels like in other museums of the similar campaigns that we can call themselves national he's got a bit more fair representation of everybody because we're all here you know we all next I mean I live in England since we all mix the old manager ines I feel a bit disappointed that there was nothing from anyone else I say we don't see these also exhibitions and if there isn't any red string of the role of Wales Northern Ireland and Scotland and for a brief period of time quite a bit of time for them yeah that will be not disposing mean specifically in the television stuff because everything about the television exhibition maybe there is enough talk fan don't know but from what we saw at least at a very general or it was specific to the England I think when we sang national television and national news those are the things that everybody's getting it's not the original stuff I think that was where I thought well England needs to yes England has many regions what about service here regions but also nations it's a very messy identity thing that's going on in the United Kingdom if you ask anyone at the moment what do they mean by nation on earth when they use those words if you get onto it the honest answer is I don't know yeah yeah using it I suppose I was crashing impact there but yeah it was more dominant stuff I think when we sat in that there was part where division notable television moment service and screening of specific corrective things that seem to be mostly twentieth century there but I don't remember seeing anything apart from nine eleven there wasn't ready twenty first century stuff nine eleven was the most recent one I think I think so yeah they went from the coronation of Elizabeth second up to %HESITATION which is nineteen fifty three to two thousand and one and the things in between every stuff like on the football team again I don't really know he continues you know I made is that nineteen sixty six England World Cup win in the fifth both is paying and I couldn't stop myself when I showed up afterwards because it is that person might think her own small children never asking her you know all the questions that that because it came on shoes expand all that that with England's when they won the World Cup and I said C. N. ho showed up with a defense go figure out what timing for that it's been over fifty years and I haven't won anything sense stop harping on it but it's not great television moment the thing that happened one time a very long time ago hi many teams have underwear when the World Cup it annoys me because I keep saying that being representatives of this great moment of British historical significance and again I think nothing of my people of my culture or even of the Scottish or Welsh or any regional English stuff there was nothing about the minor strikes there is nothing about the conflict in Northern Ireland we just had the twentieth anniversary of the signing of the Good Friday agreement so there's nothing in this range of craps up by thirty year conflict in this country which is shocking to me I think it's a real oversight and actually speaks volumes to me and yet it pretty much and so it's not that it bans on the planes heading that twin towers I find I mean I there's quite a lot of the stuff I find very difficult to watch but that there was renewed in two years that was the most of the fish I ever seen I think because I deliberately didn't lack I was a teenager when it happens think of a sixteen yeah but to turn seventeen this is an event I didn't have a huge amount of awareness of until after it's because and that same week wait find out that my grandmother had cancer and she never left the hospital so that the family was can change by our own that %HESITATION family tragedy that was happening which of course was huge test it was really only afterwards that I realised the extent to which happens with the attack it's something that in terms of images has very much set the tone for the twenty first century really I think in terms of image culture and throughout the day and but I remembered deliberately not really watching too much of the footage because I felt like it would be like watching the time tonic sank at felt disrespectful and a way to just call this awful stuff that would happen I kept thinking actually back to when we went to the Imperial War Museum north and soul thurs because they have certain it's time anyway they had a section of the mine gold package from one of the towers I remember standing in front of this huge fragments of what was a huge building and crying Mindel that was this massive I don't even know what they're called but this huge thing that looks on bendable was mine go looking chewed up from this wreckage and I remember standing before it and feeling quite nauseous actually feeling quite sick because that's what it came from and the destruction arrived in the office of the life and everything the violence event that was what was coming back to me when I saw the footage was actually the more visceral thing are the kind of opposite interaction with the original TV coverage and that was one of those people who's just stuck to TV for about eight hours and afterwards when the BBC announced that that constant replaying of with which they have they done over levels will news for the rest of the day that it was wrong city nine AM in that room at the museum yesterday the kids are with this okay the what's in things like when Tony Blair was yeah your personal growth states that kind of stuff and they also give them %HESITATION to tell about stuff and you explain it and then there was the challenge of the stuff yeah and then there was none left and then there was the Israeli embassies there right in nineteen eighty and in every instance that was an image of people dying some of the on some of the writing them succeeding could somebody being carried out restriction on the case saying what's that what's that what's that she's being honest she's saying that some of the injuries are driving that happened but I can understand why off of it they just left and was a bit much but there was more I think the case against the faith the kids in the living room plus the safe in there from before us and we got through the whole night so they seen the whole thing actually %HESITATION that we some kids coming off quite quickly yeah because the other ones they thought it was a bit boring because of this old niece the tiny making stuff it was stuff like that so you would have to coronation princess Diana and prince Charles wedding and princess Diana's funeral yeah there is a lot of frivolous sports band briefly excessive truck today and both the not encouraged Margaret Thatcher I mean I would include on the casket expensive tragedy diner tells getting married because I was saying is that this this massive institution grab this young woman who did not have a and start to cheer up but did so in a very come pretty and blowing you away at the start of a would be a permanent discount Europe as it sat at this time I think her helping though not it meant that her youngest son could marry an American person of color and it not be a scandal or a massive bank day open twenty eighteen even the particular acts of her having married Charles of the particular well it's all part of the progression is nine it's the marriage but then it's also what's happened since then a fire sale has it sort of paving the way for the next generations to actually be honest about things and for the monarchy to change everything that came to light after she died with the indicated was these people were being stifled having suffocated by rectifications being placed upon them some cases nobody even placed upon them by the public just based on by the way to the institution yeah and what that was doing to these people psychologically was always the hideous so now first even contemplate the idea that if you don't want to be with somebody if I give my word that means you have to stay with them that just seems absurd and so now we have to be like her sense of Mari relatively late compared to all of them then they've actually had girlfriends before work they've chosen the person they really want to marry it's an indicator of change I think it's fair to say we both probably be on the market Republican side of stuff here it's nice to see it changing that's sort of a Republican on this context because they say it's not the Republicans sort of where I come from it's a public in the sense of you prefer Republic rather than a monarchy in any case yeah but he needs to order scana rid of all the borders anyway we didn't see anything in any of the screens the national science and media museum site makes it up to to do that then yeah maybe a part two yeah this one there was quite a lot of stuff I really wanted to play around with I don't know her but she liked it but from the way into the thresholds part there is a really nice that lacks vision by three D. fashion and cinema cinema yes and Brian may stuff because he was really into it what what is the story of scoping we are using a few of which is got two lines and a mount for a double header for the car yeah we put it together in face to create three dimensional images still photographs I did not notice about yeah on the stand who thinks he's co written hold back center using this equipment doctor visit No he finished a few years ago in general back this year okay talking about the other professor Brian Cox I was sure I mentioned right Brian mail so I thought I'd made you aware at least two things I have to point out first Ryan yeah you are generally more informed me and second I've got a bit of an awful memory thank you attempt to remember every detail of everything you tell me but sometimes the one I think is not so I thought that was great but I really wanted to see the pics of course services type of kids and I was it but it's the one tribe of kids laughed and ran off I took half a step before the next lot just raced out of my hands started planning the specs not even play cannot them properly use really is wasted on the young I think there was lots of instances of different types of interactions between parents and kids going on around them but that was just one place where there was some serious complaints it's awful to in this eleven twelve year old kid who probably autistic and he's done and the kids just did not want to be there anymore and the kids sibling there were two kids of squabbling there Sirius everyone just needs to decompress and go somewhere else and you know these are great places to go in kids and adults generally left them but we've got to that point one of the ones that strung out it is time just there is a family with a woman who lives and then %HESITATION I used to be the chair and anytime we start one of her kids one of her not that young kids was draped over locked cabinet right around the museum on this thing instead of using their functioning addicts and one of them pretty quick for him at the Sharjah this father for not letting him be the next one to get the wi right drawings the fellows even St this is the child was yelling that it was to be served yeah very good definition of abuse I just thought if I was your parent Beatty town he I think if you raise the battery Cherokee keep talking mate I got some new which I just by saying thanks to all this awful like it anyway anyway but I was stuff like that wasn't pleasant I have to say that many companies museum for its patrons but we must acknowledge that if it's a free museum the way that any free museum functions is by appealing to families with young kids who are gonna be buying stuff in the gift shop using the cafe putting money into things like the arcade games that's an income stream that the venue courts that relies on its part of the obstacle course he's going to think that %HESITATION three inaccessible to anyone that looks about eighty people will come I find it really shock and but then I'm thinking back to the day I spent with your children and the centralized in new castle in the February half term that was high even with kids I mean I would say that was based here that day and then you see him yesterday was but I didnt lines C. A. K. E. and rage okay I saw them all cooperating and being and breaks I didn't yes rather than each other but it wasn't and that I I think you'll find that his mind not sort of way that it was yesterday it was always nice great they're all excited that would stop it you each other how to do things and they would cooperate with each other these are relatively comparable institutions one is a science museum and one is a science and media museum center for life it's about that it's it costs a small fortune to get into I really wouldn't I would like to have salt that that wouldn't make a difference and I mean certainly any three museums but her being chan I go to Manny I mean that was just shocking behavior I can never say no I can bet you with some of the extent of this %HESITATION yesterday yeah you could see the other thing and that's normal but this was consistent the whole time we were there every kid we encountered almost his rage every kids from whatever background whatever color whatever Bella Dayne whatever religious background everything every single child yesterday okay great what about that one kid who we work with well yeah I said I'm doing this I gave my control so and you and she played against yeah but as I think we both quickly die and I think we need to get as one kid maybe this is a revealing comparison between the northwest and northeast possible but again I would really like to think no this is very narrow data that we've collected several figures I don't want to collect more so the next three weeks testing this that much time spent on kids well anyway there was some really cool stuff and no wonder lab so we have that crying to first that it was really really busy and then when we got back because we wanted to see if we can get into the film but we missed the start of it and I think there was no need access thought that meant that they wandered up was quieter so we have to go they can not some sort of property and it was really killed but then they all started to come back again and we could not stop stuff we could use a respectable further off of the off my head he said that was only a day after a month of a drop of water hitting the surface of a still pool the thing that was just you get a very the number of milliseconds and drop fulls and when the photo was taken by this fixed camera I'm quite fascinated with science because %HESITATION to briefly five analysts raised to see but it's a knowledge GLIAC too it makes it possible this is simply because the Nissan thresholds of perception one of the things is when you we see it all the time we see slow motion images of drops of water hitting something it doesn't it doesn't create ripples it creates a kind of little mini volcano which has an undulating Rick and then if it's intense enough fundraising room will each separate out into lots of tiny little drops which will hang in there for a moment and then they'll put down to and you don't see that that happens way too quickly to be perceived by our sincere right I'm quite obsessed with the fact that photography can see this thirty three can by being able to take a piece of time she's far too brief for us to perceive it as a distinct effect if there is a lot to do this unfriended them presents that it presents a site that we would never ordinarily see we also tend by looking at it for five seconds ten seconds a minute even we see things that we've seen all the time I was seeing them as if they last for longer than they actually do and this is the thing that tabloid press or say three because if they manage to get a photograph of somebody that just talking right and they blink while they talk and so if you have lots of photographs of them just this is the still photographs and took one of them is someone with their eyes closed in the mouth open looking like that trump looking I've seen yeah further the it's like using someone fainting of course people are doing this all the time anyway we're watching people do this which is not seeing people you get out and it's still fun to have slept on the cover of September newspaper and it makes it look like a person who was just talking cool in the case of Yemen Miliband just eating a bacon sandwich it makes it look like they don't know how to talk they don't have it either by consent which they don't know how to remain conscious and that basic deception the tabloids love to do it's something that we should all be media literate enough to go out that's clearly not an image of something that somebody did for any more than twentieth of a second it doesn't indicate that they don't know how to read the bacon sandwich okay and yet as a rule the majority of people okay maybe that's not correct but a frost number of people in this country in the same which is not that don't go that's a function of the yes it's an inter in moments so awareness of the consequences of using specific technologies is not high enough to make some general population yeah but I think having an exhibition like that where they can actually take that photograph they can take those that re injection businesses you would hope that that would communicate to somebody all right there's all this stuff that we count per se so here is a from yeah one specific aspect of this museum and of course everything that we're learning about here has some sort of a government function even contest by one of them was very I mean how long is she this intuition shout very how he's being able to understand the building isn't haunted that does just a particular acoustic arrangement that means that actors hang around the car yeah there's a helpful preseason home page they had the whole of mirrors the Stuart hall of mirrors of course you were so many children running through it back and forth bumping into the merits that you could actually easily tell where the measure because they were covered in thirty marks C. could spell the difference between bets clean surfaces off it's like air from not wanting to get through all the matters by looking at the ground I don't see the difference in the reflection also somebody's discarded package for what used to be a company's money and I was a bit of a talent one of the corners to be fat the big launch prince songs others are available the big large prints on the read on the way into the home of members said Wilkes lady with your hands and friends speak patrons being informed they should make three Sam Katz a cursor Darden and I threw it like nobody's business not signage for every thing that I can get invited to that right it's a unit of ours there was quite a deliberate decision of I'm going to show the human in the current interacting with this thing as I said the ten diverse and educated that does apply to some people and doesn't is box the total set instrumentalists quality of diverse answer collectively diverse humans in each case they are trying to the human interacting with the object was not necessarily a white yeah it was I suppose there is a range of ages of colors of abilities one of them was an old person with a guide dog there was one with a person in a wheelchair other people wearing turbans or people wearing his jobs there where kids several people adults people dressed in all manner of ways and all different shades that you can possibly be is a human being I was just really nice actually it was something that we notice or walking Ryan I just felt really refreshing what do you do you do when you do that is you start to establish a register of types of humans which you recognize and so even with such a big range the still tops of humans would you haven't acknowledged exist and that my preference for doing something like that would just be the stick figures yeah Hey at specific plans you've got skinny privilege sick people because they said they said they speak up actually I think the role fairly slim all these people so so if you still got a better skinny privilege there but not super model size which is also nice stick figures seventy great but skinny privilege to know I have quite a good time and someone third ones were actually you could feel scientists out like there is and I don't know if he did the one with the vibration from the floor those are just a cultural away from that one to ask you to do one of the things there was sand so no I didn't do them at a time when I had been on that for awhile but also that was the second time I was on it because the first time a small child fish me off and then almost immediately after and after crashing out to conduct services this time on the phone and have four different types of music and it leads to rock jazz band grass and classical you cheese one and it would play in the speakers and the speakers were actually underneath your fate on today's panel underneath they had little speakers at the sight seeing you could hear properly is out there at the base speakers under nice because we're trying to see how much space you could feel and of course the rock one was taken me back so the cakes a single tape when I was younger and a bit more sprightly you could say that coming up this edition that judge how far up your legs actually you could feel the vibration comes your pen with a vibration and the water quite a bit the changing the frequency and seeing how much the water would create the way thanks I didn't understand science affect well enough and I will look into it more because the launch you which was how full of water and laid horizontally for a long time like this off of water and that one and there's a diagonal join into that you talk about diagonal stretch there was a big speaker and so we did despite varying with volume and frequency you could fill that GM with alternate with lots of fundraising at and you could taste the frequency was sufficiently high no matter what the volume was you could not make any sort of installations in water but low you got frequency the more likely would be able to have some very regular looking vibrations in the water I couldn't understand what was happening what was he doing compressing the ad was it also seems compressing water because I do have a voice service no one is compressible as physician because it was quite a long shape and this is a net one and so it would be quite a big reaction one end and it be interesting to see how far along the water go before it petered alright and it would create bubbles in the water and they would travel and book along the top of that for awhile and it spits many nice shapes one thing that I was fascinated with was there was a room with lots of text that started about how if you shine colored lights on the code surfaces you make the services look very different from the conventional never these big paintings of carrots normal and the lights in the room a constantly changing from one color to another and they would never just white lights and the question about the parents we spoke color the parent wants his you don't know okay read or play or green and they had I don't know if he's still in it because they had the very first color photographs found was of a right McCall and expand a little bit behind the money she that because you think red lights said bring on the red of the feathers and the go away if men and not women the AV room at socks any time I went in to either of them just courageous with massive foundation problems we could rock up at this museum at lunch time had lunch and then winced yeah and so we were saying is that this is about yeah now it's ten o'clock in the morning the next day and the other would be the ideal time to go with other mediums to see if our contract before they go to Wales we can do non media ties things well it's got a really excellent website where you can actually see quite a lot of stick collections and that sets of the W. W. dot science and media museum dot org dot C. K. three the fate well I start website with all the information about everything that we've talked about it as well if you wanted to check it all right quite a lot of those exhibitions are on for a good part of the massive twenty eighteen Cimarron to loans of summer some of them are permanent seven American temporary things that will change but it's worth checking out what they've go out having been to a much sponsor previous incarnation this museum I must say I'm impressed what is the company that was ready hopefully the game's final be on for a while if he wanted to recreate part of your childhood and the case I had a legal consoles including hand held ones like the original gameboy that pulls gray Brechin have things we had one of those when I was young the Sega mega try today and sixty Fullerton the arcades radiant but we haven't really got go on any of them work checking I think maybe at a time when it's not a school holiday if you actually want to see stuff in general get a job which means that you go on breaks at times that on school yeah that's today's take a message it's great a lot but it's a great but the ones that we kinder just straight we're not those great kids unfortunately they were very very rare exceptions to the rule thanks very much for listening and I hope that discussion was useful do you really recommend checking I to me CM if you ever find yourself in Bradford I've been reflected in a safe investment in editing this episode I feel like I've come across is probably a bit negative Anna certainly that's not the intention and I think it was yes we ended up %HESITATION but you could probably tell we had quite a stressful time because I still can't get over the volume of really freaked at people and children we happened to encounter and I would like to hope that that's not typical of this museum but it's probably the worst I've ever experienced in any museum regardless of that there were some discussions I was a bit worried that I was coming across as may be too harsh operates the photography I thought really hard about it and I thought well I'm gonna leave and a lot of what I've said because I've reflected on that and it's a ruler for credit an anonymous tip go well actually I don't actually think this work is locked gates and it's not personal to an artist and while I'm genuinely very pleased at this person's got the opportunity to be funded by the arts kinds of anger and man that's a really fantastic achievement and it's great to see what can happen when people get goes it stuff I think my frustration as as a try to convey that there's such a huge discrepancy between what the arts council of England is prepared to support and the outer lock of support that's happening in Northern Ireland right now I am not sure if the all star orchestra or demonic more representation across the board I certainly needed and worse fighting for and that doesn't mean that anybody else house of a site that's the important thing to stress so I think there's bigger issues around are to funding and art follow UP that are worse proving and Terry in greater detail so I think I'm going to try to seek appropriate people to get on the podcast and speak could bite that sort of thing because it's something that I think is really important today US and to discuss but I don't feel terribly knowledgeable by art finance and business and the markets in that sort of thing it's something I'm learning a bite I don't feel like I have the authority to really get into it by myself if I come across as a bit snappy N. might remember if you see my response to use of photographs it's because well those were the things that I was getting from the photographs and high they were produced that's from me being somebody who's studied photography pretty extensively has a PhD in film and visual culture and has spent many years learning and teaching film the statics just to say that I'm not being snapped bait that's what I can see from the images that those were the decision making processes at play there just to say as well that even if I find a topic to be fairly frivolous I absolutely do you think that there should always be space for the frivolous I think it's just a matter of taste and exhibitions but people watching football matches is not to my taste but it will be to the taste of other people and certainly locals here big football fans and supporters of their local team and who am I to take that away from them I am aware of all those issues and I think there's probably a whole other discussion to be had as well %HESITATION but audiences and consumers of culture I'm a big listener of winter tan meant that mark Kermode and Simon Mayo film review show and very frequently their discussions by audience behaviors and the cinema something I feel very strongly about each is other people's performances behaviors and sentiments and being mindful of other people's experience especially when they have had to pay money for something but I think even regardless of that this was a museum that was free to enter and and it was free to say most of the exhibitions but that shouldn't mean that children get to touch me to push me out of the way and it shouldn't mean that we have to tolerate it really awful rude behavior I think there's an issue around sonic spaces while as I described in the risk children shouting to the point where they were red in the face at their parents possibly this is a wider parenting saying and here my again to have an opinion on not I am not a parent it's probably a I cannot relate to larger issue %HESITATION rinds consent and shared spaces respect and consideration my lan shared spaces culture should be for everyone and that should be shared experience and at same time we shouldn't be silencing each other either that's just basic respect Manisha there's bigger discussions to have her on those kinds of things the idea of having to share space while not preventing other people from engaging in something I don't know if there's a general sense of entitlement that children have set everything is four and a bite them and no one else can you do something and that you don't have to wait your turn you can just go and patient adult off something I was being physically touched and paste by these other human beings but because they're young human beings are not legal adults I feel like I can't say anything to them so I think there's probably more to taste all right there with those issues so I just wanted to be clear that I'm aware of those things and I do worry about it hi some of the things we say come across I just hope we're pitching it right but I also know that we can always get everything right and everybody's constantly learning and constantly improving we also have to stand by our responses to things today if you're still listen thanks so much for that me same apace and car find a few things I'll leave you with the original ending I recorded for this podcast I hope you find the discussion ready useful and interesting and to tackle it the science and media museum swept sites it's really thorough and you can see lots of stuff from their archives on there an updated information about what the current expressions are in the future a reminder that we're trying to make this party broads and we're really trying to get casts on and if you're right there listening and you're working on something and you're ready and trusses and a particular aspect of something that could be considered as audio condor facial culture please get in touch via Twitter you can find me out P. E. A. R. and also you can email audio visual cultures that's all one word all lower case at G. mail dot com not until we get a proper website and app property managing sick that organized so any money that's received by Apache on or donated on pay pal dot me forward slash P. E. I. prior all of that's going towards improving my equipment and getting the resources they need online to be able to pick the podcast on iTunes and more accessible websites for you I've already got a linkedin RSS feed on a cast I'm not sure how that's working out for any of you but do you let me know and if you're right there you're nesting and cheery feeling like I'm pretty and after all the stuff that's probably trade and to give me a shirt if you know any better that would be so much appreciated if there's any other ways of getting things right there without having to spend the money until then if you go to my PhD on P. it's you'll see my funding goals and the things that I am aiming to see of up to date to sustain the podcast I work freelance so I don't have a regular income and I'm trying really hard to make every inch of educational resources from my teaching materials a podcast has taken up a lot of time because I'm pretty persnickety about editing it quite a lot I'm editing I Olean knowing a miss and silences and reputations and things as much as I can to try and make it smoother listening experience I might give your raw file at some point just to show you how much I actually added alright any financial support would be gratefully received because I'm trying to make videos and screen casts and trying to work on more publications as well for broader audiences fan nation academic audience that I've been writing for before I'm ready Pasha by broadening education and and I feel very strongly that everybody should have access to all kinds of education so that's what I'm attempting to date while I've got the mains and the more means I get from crowd funding no longer I can keep going anyway enough about that thank you so much for lessons thanks again to the end if you have it's been great to find some really nice comments on Twitter for machines and colleagues have given it a go and that's a slow burn we're starting off very small but I hope that this will build a really nice community thanks for sticking with me if you need it S. very welcome I hope you do stick with this much up to you next time
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Audiovisual Cultures 104 – Beyond the Halls with Mackenzie Finklea automated transcript

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This is Audiovisual Cultures, the podcast that explores different areas of the arts and media join me your host Paula Blair and the researchers, practitioners and enthusiasts I meet along the way see our website at audiovisualcultures.wordpress.com and other links in the show notes for more information for now enjoy the show thank you for cheating and see what do you think she'll cultures the podcast that explores different areas of arts and culture with me your host all up there to date we're returning to a topic of great interest to me but it's one that we haven't visited for a while namely museums  with my special guest today mackenzie  Finkley. mackenzie is the author of beyond the holes an insider's guide to loving museums and mackenzie has a background and that's our policy as well so these are all great topics for us to really get stuck and say after I expanded very warm welcome to you I can say hello %HESITATION hello it's so nice to meet you and talk to you today yes like grace McKenzie hi are you eating are you well today I am doing well today thank you for asking if you hear any %HESITATION low but is that is the fun musical sounds of the cicadas in the trees outside my house it is very hot where I am and I'm very thankful to be inside in the air conditioning okay interesting is it okay to ask where bites your at the moment absolutely I am from Houston Texas in the United States that's pretty exciting Texas is a state I'm very curious about it I'm very curious but holistically emeritus for Sierra taxes since an interesting place I gather but yes very hard at the moment yes it is an interesting place that is an enormous state with all different kinds of cultures and biomes where can I talked quite a bit but museums I hope we're going to properly Nur die to play museums it's a topic I really love we have had some episodes about eighty CM visits and certain museums and that kind of thing but not for read a long time so I'm so grateful that you've brought up this opportunity to talk about next set topic really close to my heart as well I've lived all kinds of museums since childhood and I was wondering what is the debate museums that really draws you in so much that's such a good question what is it about museums that draws me in so much I think for me I am an incredibly visual person and I also love to learn and the museums are beautiful marriage of those two things I love going to museums and getting to see objects of history kind of having the starstruck moments where you're like hello this is a piece of the moon you can actually touch you know things like that and getting to learn then to continue on the moon example there's this really great exhibit where they had all these different scales and you could learn about the difference between mass and gravity with the scales and it would tell you how much she would weigh on different planets who right on the moon versus all the other things instead of getting to see those actual numbers and laugh about them with your friends right like the thousands of pounds you weigh on Jupiter right it's fun interactives and moments like that and shared experiences that are why I love museums so much traffic on Sir do you have a favorite type of museum do you love all the same sekali R. as a techie types of sneezing cyclic like some specialized museums I have a special place in my heart for natural history museums those are probably my favorite type I do love all types I love visiting all types %HESITATION more recently I found a new found love for art museums and contemporary art so my favorites and my current loves are always changing but there is a special place in my heart for natural history is not to to U. S. life on this planet and learning more about that more but she made history what is it exactly by natural history that really get to see much it's exactly that it's all of the above what gets me is trying to answer these really big picture questions of who are we where do we come from how does the world work in all its facets you know how to animals live breathe eat reproduce what's the water cycle what's volcanoes and natural disasters and all of these really big wow factor things that are very much real parts of our life that we for centuries are seeking to understand and always always there is something new to learn and there's always a new fossel it's been discovered that teaches us something different about evolution of some species whether or not it's us or %HESITATION turtles or dolphins or you know the list goes on and on that's why I love them there's always something new to learn and it answers really big picture questions and concepts yeah I'm a big fan of sat T. I. E. when I was a kid I probably still stay from feminist I I have a burning desire to be a paleontologist's dinosaurs are must love of I think yes to anything pre historic is mind blowing to me and hi that sets and tell us today is ridiculous to learn of plates have you had the opportunity to visit lots of difference natural history museums and lots of different locations I wondered what you think of the sock comparative experience yes I have had the luxury of visiting other natural history museums in other locations and I will tell you that one of my ultimate favorites and it's gonna be a funny answer because it's not like the biggest or the most impressive but one of my favorites is the natural history museum on the university of Oxford campus okay what I really love about that museum is just the architecture the %HESITATION this is gonna be such a Gen Z. thing to say but the vibes but also there are these really cool parts of the museum where there are all of these columns made out of all the different types of stone that are native to the British Isles and that is such like an incredible learning moment because not only are you showing like you know the strength of stone how it can be used but in context with actually where the museum is and that makes that particular museum unique because so many natural history museums cover all the exact same topics or they try to have the exact same replicas of famous bottles but not all of them have the fossils right because only one museum can have it in the one copy but I thought that one was particularly compelling that in a very just generally enjoyable experience for me %HESITATION that's ridiculous here I haven't even been to Oxford so he's got me on that one that you sang that does remind me there is a really nice natural history museum in Manchester university so just a bit north of socks and it's talks right end of the campus so easy you really have to know what's in there and I love the small ones like that we can collect the chore syndicate all the samples and it'll different rock samples and stuff it's a really nice example tonight where anybody does something unique because as you say there's a pretty big ones you know opens today natural history museum of London that's when you have to go see if you're there and absolutely yeah it's huge and it's almost overwhelming there's so much stuff I am also an example of Zeus smaller rooms as well I think that's really important to remember are these the kinds of things you go into the and your back beyond the wholesome mean what was it that really motivated GT go right I love museums not enough other people love museums I need this project this problem what was it about all the stuff that goes to the right topic it was exactly all of what you're describing so when I was doing my studies in anthropology towards the end of my undergraduate degree I realized that my interests primarily lie in displays of human culture and I was getting %HESITATION professional museum studies certificate and I was visiting at least one U. CM a week many times more than one and I was doing all of this writing and learning all these things and having these great experiences and I wanted to share that with other people I wanted other people to enjoy museums and learn these valuable things that I was learning at my studies in a very specific kind of program but I wanted it to be accessible %HESITATION and help people you know love museums more sense it's important and we can of course get into that later if you like but ultimately what I wanted to write was something that was it accessible as I believe museums should be accessible to everyone so why would I want this book to be any different right I wanted something that wasn't a boring tech X. book like truthfully many of the books I had to read for class and I wanted something that wasn't just a very specific guide to a specific kind of museum or place or period I wanted it to be a general exploration of museums especially for people who don't visit or think they're not important or just want to understand them better so that's ultimately what I produced was a guide to loving museums that covers a ton of different areas green I wonder is well it might what do people see as barriers T. access as you say because I know my experience in the U. K. it's may be seen as a for a middle class things today is going to museums even if most of them are free to go and say it's just something that other people daily where is my background is probably a bit unique in that I am my grandfather was a security guard and %HESITATION living history museum so I spent a lot of my summers just running a fight these fields and this living history museum so it was a fluke and transports me Sam so I was physically learning about the history of my please so it was the Ulster folk and transport museum in Northern Ireland they would have said actual colleges that people really live stand would have been taken apart very carefully rebuilt some sites and sometimes they would have investigators are demonstrators the last time I was there and this was just a few years ago they had somebody using the latency no somebody actually waving the way they would have a couple of hundred years ago you know and telling us if I didn't mean it is just such a fascinating experience like you're saying that's when you can actually see it and it comes alive free it's much more meaningful so it's something I think about quite a bit is how do we get more people to realize this is for years while you know it's fake questions %HESITATION just to try and drill into that a bit more we want to purchase G. Shanker are helpful and trying to achieve not that's a good one I think it's a lot of what you just said %HESITATION making museums accessible and in many ways entertaining and the entertainment value can either be in your face or more nuanced and here's kind of what I mean by that is within your face entertainment you're gonna have really interactive museums opportunities to ride on train cars you know through nineteen twenty Chicago right or actually touching a moon rock to use an earlier example but then the other more nuanced ways in which %HESITATION museums can provide entertainment value is through fun games or educational curriculum that museum educators provide and museum educator is like a specific position at a museum but I'm sure you're familiar with and those are typically the people that lead school tours or field trips and they will come up with a whole set of really interesting games for ways to interact with things as simple as a painting on a wall to really provide context learning opportunity and that's something that's actually fun and memorable so that's another thing that I really wanted people to have access to was games that they could play on their own in art museums and help them realize it's not as boring as you might think it is at face value yeah is this just to push a bit further without points on interactivity I'm a big fan of tears I really like a museum terror and to see absolutely yes three the ISIS somebody you because it's usually a volunteer it's not even always a member of staff at somebody who has such passion or maybe they're retired historian or something and they have such a passion that they want to lead people three and for you to see it through their eyes I think the last time I managed to date that was an Attenborough I think it's the national museum of Scotland it was thought it was a retired historian and he was just so lovely and so knowledgeable oil and just really passionate you get a nice good people and you're walking around together and %HESITATION I mean this was in December of twenty nineteen so this was before things were really naming properly it was a real joy because I think it's a Saturday or you can get really overwhelmed if it's a very fake museum with lots of different sections and it's trying to cover all the bases and to just see it three right we're just gonna get the specific things in there you're going to see a narrative unfolds got something it's really getting to me what do you think it bites hers and that sort of thing because you can also get order you terse order ops and things like that they'll take you on a tour of mean do you have much experience aside or what are your thoughts on those sorts of activities absolutely in my personal opinion is that I love in person to worse more than anything because audio tours are great they are accessible you can use them at any time you can access them from home in some cases personally I'm less inclined to listen to an area ambiguous robot voice as I'm walking through a museum way more inclined to exactly what you were saying watch a person get really animated and passionate about the things that they're talking about hearing from their expected natural off the cuff storytelling and not as scripted recordings I do really enjoy museum tours especially in the before times you know when I would travel to go see a museum I would make an effort to try to book a museum tour because that's also if you have a limited amount of time in a city or a place they will show you the highlights they will show you the most compelling pieces or artifacts that the museum highlights and then tell you from their perspective it gives you really great insight into the culture of that place as well getting to experience it through the eyes of the person who lived it was online math it's it's not something you a field of in the past couple of years because we've had last access I don't know what your pandemic experience in Spain but I have to museums near ye been accessible through online means I mean there's all sorts of implications are with from dying and he's able to provide that of course then again we've been able to access places in the world we may not have been able to before because we can travel there so I was wondering hi his your access to museums bane and the past couple of years hasn't changed a lot I will say so my book was published in December of twenty nineteen so slightly in the before times right I do talk a great deal about the digitization of museums and how a lot of museums even before Kobe we're starting to put a lot of their collections online to be more accessible to people which is an absolutely great thing and speaks volumes about the rapid acceleration and development of the internet and digital access in general then during a global pandemic that rapid acceleration towards digitisation such a hardware display is more important now than ever because many museums especially in the beginning when everything especially museums had to shut down entirely a lot of museums didn't bounce back from that number had to permanently close some are on the brink of having to permanently close and so being able to provide visitors with ways to engage and support the museum from the comfort of their home has played an increasingly important role not only in accessibility for learning opportunities but also in supporting the museum's business model and keeping it open and continuing to be able to preserve cultural history so locally to answer your question yes the museum's near me have done a really great job of providing virtual events especially in the in the thick of it as we were starting to get better %HESITATION but a couple months ago they were doing a really great job of providing outdoor events things where people could come together distanced but still have these great learning opportunities or a lot of museums near me and across the country have implemented the concept of time demands so that way you come at a certain time and there's not too many people in the museum it runs to the course to prevent the spread of disease a lot of that has changed in the past couple weeks even but yeah hopefully that answers your question it's a lot to think about it I think and as you say the implications of that acceleration of moving everything online we're in very intense times it feels there were times especially for early on when we didn't really know what this was he asks you know a year and a half ago I felt a bit overwhelmed just thinking oh this is going online %HESITATION that's going online %HESITATION I can view got exhibition online I'm sitting but I need to get some work son I can't just sit and let me see here yeah the three sixty degrees online all day and ended up forgetting about it most of it so I think in a way personally I fax est museums and galleries probably a lot less than I would have done if I had of been able to just go right I'm just gonna transfer it to him to school and have a look round an exhibition or something and I don't know hi David title but I wonder if other people are taught that similar experience where people have access to more because before they didn't have the time and then they're on furlough and the dates and all sorts of things I think people who study this sort of thing in a formal way are going to have some work cut out for them to go through hell with him would you like to receive updates links and special offers straight to your inbox and visit audio visual cultures tower presto com to sign up to our mailing list something I eat thank you bye a lot as well as potential problems as PCM speeches we were talking earlier but some of the bigger older ones and especially here in the U. K. risks auctions last colonial history and places like the British Museum matches in upstate global and situation and many ways because there's nothing actually British and they have very little and he everything's covered from everywhere else and I was wondering if you ever come across people challenging yet but that sort of thing because I feel like it's something we need to address that we need to confront said we need to just say yep that's our history and that's not but why do you feel the bite those sorts of issues if they arise and how you might deal with challenges to pot I do really enjoy this topic I like talking about the British Museum because truthfully I have a love hate relationship with that because the very first time I got to visit the British Museum was in the summer of twenty eighteen so I had not yet finished my degree I was the summer before my senior year %HESITATION budding anthropologist just like jumping in my seat waiting in line to get into the British Museum because it is you're absolutely right this global institution where you can see thousands of years of human culture across the world in one place started walking through and seeing all of the things and wondering where they came from and how they came to be into that institution and learning more about the ways in which those objects were acquired and then some of the contentions regarding the fact that a lot of those objects have been requested to be formally returned and subsequently denied so the more I learned the more that the magic was kind of stripped away from me so it's been really wonderful institution I absolutely believe that something like that should exist but at the same time yeah you have really big ethical questions that need to be answered and yes people do challenge me on this topic they will often say well especially in the case of the British Museum if they started giving things back they have to give everything back and then they have nothing left which is such an exaggeration and far from the truth but I think that certainly concessions you need to be made I think it's an important topic to philistine and I think we just need to be honest I've heard our colonial power in this country I think the sooner we are in the center we don't yet our ancestors to thought and it's not pretty intense violence on that's horrible scenery might maybe move on as a society yeah we need to find that balance is holding things in posterity and learning from not passed but also not just forgetting and sang all everything's fine and whitewashing it you know quite naturally it's good to know I used to say look I thought sort of thing I think it is an experience when I first I think it was two thousand and nine when I first went to the British Museum and I had thought I was going around going oh everything's from everywhere else and how did they get yeah I had a very similar awakening to it and then just gradually find out more and more but that's not to say that people shouldn't go because it's a really yeah one situation like so many of them that's another pretty basic example and I do have a great love of small museums curiosity type museums ready specific things whether it's seen them myself for where I've seen them on the TV program and they're all ministers places to visit remember being in Barcelona one time and there is a chocolate museum and I was just solely sculptures made out of chocolate I never intended to find somewhere I wasn't looking for that I didn't know I needed thought my life but I went and I had a choice tied as under if you had examples of things again that were smaller and worker came because we talked the natural history examples earlier but at any other came to three specific things that you really love him much like to highlight there are hundreds of small and quirky museums and the first one that comes to mind it's so embarrassing but it's hilarious there is a toilet seat museum oh really in Texas is kind of off the beaten path and it's not about the history of toilet seats or anything more than anything it's a public art display so he has this essentially a garage at this random man's property %HESITATION where he has floor to ceiling toilet seats that people have decorated signs and just completely imprinted their personality on too and I think that there is just so much to think about in terms of what that says about American culture individualism consumerism like you really could get into the weeds with that but also at the surface it's this really fun and quirky like toilet seats you know I think that's a fun example in haven't friend he's an artist and her her work is ready the weird things that she collects and she's done residency site in Virginia you're ready small tines in Virginia and she's done artworks based on right this time has this particular Moscow and sushi's meet at an art exhibition slash museum items things to do with this hot dog mascot you know it's really super specific really off the beaten track I really love things like that really quite blur the fine J. between what's an art exhibition the museum collection yeah you know something that really muddy suse waters I'm quite and spots I'm quite interested and intrigued by things that aren't necessarily museums but the jury yen and then you think actually this is quite like a museum you probably have places like this in the United States as well I don't know if you're aware of the National Trust for example or English heritage you put me on their buildings to places that they look after they become museum of fights I suppose that since and I was wondering what you thought of as well is that a tear of the CMS occasion another awkward first yeah that process of museum of finding an old place or anything like that is that something you've encountered very much sure what do you think that I would send the National Trust in the United Kingdom is definitely more prevalent than the national trust's awareness in the United States so similar concept the National Trust here seeks to preserve places of architectural significance but the National Trust in England is of a different breed I say England because that's the specific region I've been exposed to the most the National Trust and the United Kingdom is a different rate because it's become something more of almost like a passport you have all of these places where you see the little logo and you can almost fill them out and take them off and go and visit them it's also significantly smaller country to explore but %HESITATION yeah I'm getting to go to see places in Dover %HESITATION you'd see the little logo going to the Stonehenge I believe is also included in the National Trust the national trust's in England definitely and the United Kingdom was certainly more obvious to me that and the existence of a national trust in the United States and museum of occasion there are a lot of places and I include them in the book is that don't necessarily feel like museums but in many ways aren't because museums are preservation's of human culture and if we look at it that way lots of things can be used yeah libraries kind of falls under that category historical holds certainly fall under that category and so the museum of the cation of something if we want to think about that word is probably including a gift shop including educational materials to explain the context of the architecture of a place or its contents ticketing and branding and all these things so it's almost like could be institutionalizing of something that makes it a formal museum and there are always those questions over things what gets to be preserved what is deemed worthy enough to be captain posterity he makes those decisions he gets the side when he gets what money to make those decisions so it unfolds and unfolds all the time that's quite a complex issue I think is quite recently at the National Trust property call Tom Brady hall in Worcestershire and it was only saved because it has the specific wall paintings they're actually part of the walls these murals are painted and sites by a specific artist they need to pick specific sayings it's these Greek myths same spot the faces of men swapped out for political figures of the time as just a splash of this is how wealthy we are this is where our political leanings site you're welcome in this ice if you're happy to discuss those things and it was one of those where debate because he says they were falling you know in the nineteen forties and fifties and the families just can't afford to keep them on anymore and that a labour government demanded the risk very high taxes and this was one of hundreds of calls see if only because of these paintings so we've lost so many other super similar but this one's there because of the spending you know so it's still that's sort of questions what gets to see if a place is quite interesting it is very interesting to think about the value of things right if you can come down and think about things of historical significance that may be easy to choose like I was reading this morning about and our archaeological discovery and almost fully intact tent made out of all the parts of a mammoth and its claim to fame is that it's one of the most early examples of architecture mmhm like how incredible is it to be able to say that you have that in your museum so you can say that the thing that you have is the first or an early example up or something incredibly unique that's often unique and rarity ultimately is what makes things very important museums happens like what's worthy of being on display is often a matter of what they have access to sometimes museums can be dumping grounds for donations of people I had a really interesting conversation and interviews part of my book with an exhibition director at the Houston museum of natural science we're standing in the great hall and emotions around and he goes out everything is trash everything in this museum is trash and I was like come again everything is strange because he was saying you know at some point or another it was something that someone didn't want anymore because if they really wanted it you know they would hold on to it for it and want to have it for themselves so either they didn't want it or they passed away and there are errors didn't want it anymore and gifted it to the museum so that's another interesting way that things end up in museums and then because they're in a museum there's this inherent perception of value because it's institutionalized right so a very interesting conversation nine I hadn't heard of that way of thinking about it before bed makes total sense I have managed to see behind the scenes a little bit one time enemy see and when I was doing my PhD research the curator of the Ulster museum in Belfast ways show me some things because I was using something from their permanent collection notice %HESITATION yeah I just needed to watch and study it yeah she's great she gave me this very quick sure and the stage spaces of the museum and there's just all these great art works and sculptures sins you artifacts and drawers and drawers and shelves and shelves for the boxes and everything and she said everything here is virtually of display everything here could be I tired sometimes we circulate stuff but people have their favorite Sir things right there that people just come here specifically to saying they want to see their Spanish Armada clean say want to see a bit already beaten up cost of a T. rex skills well we've got actual dinosaur fossils here but they're just these tiny fragments of things people find on a peach but the real threats of actually awhile fossilized bits of voxel dinosaur it's the iceberg this thing is suppose of what we see in a museum is just the one tense you know the nine ten Sunder is everything inside the box and we don't get to see absolutely would you or someone you know make a great cast an audio visual cultures then email audio visual culture shock dot com to have a conversation they can see Sir anything else told that you really like to chat about it today I feel like I've thrown a lot of questions out but if there's anything you told that you think it's really important that you have a just a message right there for people anything is holy crap the youth like to say yeah one thing I'd like to come back to that I briefly alluded to early on in our conversation and the importance of museums are why they matter why should we bother why should we visit them from what we discussed museums are places where cultural heritage is preserved and if we are not supporting those institutions visiting them what happens to all of those things do they continue to be preserved not even just professionally but just at all we are what we lose when we lose history you know there's all of these doom and gloom concepts of like %HESITATION we're doomed to repeat it but what I'm thinking of is just the learning opportunities the immersive exhibits the moments that things come alive really in your mind not only are they great spaces a community but ultimately preservation of human culture so I want to encourage people to visit support experience with your loved ones museums in all their glory that's great pretty good message and important message I can see where can we find out more at the union about your back you can read more about me and the book at mackenzie frankly dot com pretty easy to remember you can find the book on the ever ubiquitous Amazon dot com you can also find my book on bookshop dot org which I encourage people to support as well to support independent bookstores across the world accents my interest not sentiments as well both mackenzie frankly it's been such a joy speaking with you today you're very welcome back anytime if you ever wanna talk about a specific saying %HESITATION that you're working on or if you have a new project coming I it's you know just give us a show you're welcome back anytime and it's been pretty tough each day mazing thank you so much it's been such a joy talking to you and I look forward to more checks in the future