MH: What is your role with Local Projects?<\/strong><\/p>\nNathan:<\/b> I\u2019m the Director of Strategy, which means that I help to identify where problems are, or the opportunities are, as opposed to defining what software to use or tools in a toolkit. \u00a0My role is part business development, part operations, a bit of creative direction, and partnering with designers and technologists to figure out what the big vision for the project is. \u00a0It entails a lot of strategy in the traditional sense, but also includes research about what a museum is really trying to do: turning a vague or brief idea into something full-fledged.<\/p>\n
MH: How do you do that?<\/strong><\/p>\nNathan:<\/b> I talk to museums to gather a wealth of knowledge: What do they offer? \u00a0What will the visitors want to see? \u00a0What are the current high or low points of the visit? \u00a0What are visitors actually experiencing? \u00a0When someone walks into the museum, they don\u2019t stop being who they are — and the more museums can remember that, the more they can address what is happening to their visitors in the outside world. \u00a0Local Projects tries to evolve the traditional \u201cpure\u201d experience of a museum — looking at the visit in isolation, so to speak. \u00a0We take into account what the visitors\u2019 experiences outside of the museum might be, which lets us put the visitor’s needs first when designing an experience.<\/p>\n
MH: What is the hardest part of working with museums?<\/strong><\/p>\nNathan:<\/b> It varies from museum to museum. \u00a0The bigger that museums get, the more departments are involved in leadership — and the more voices there are to be involved. \u00a0It\u2019s difficult to find a solution that will make everyone happy all of the time, so we\u2019ve gotten good at balancing. \u00a0Everyone comes to the table with valid experiences, but we have to move quickly, especially with prototyping. \u00a0You can do talking in board rooms for years upon years, and by the time you finally design the thing, changes come up because your audience or needs have changed. \u00a0The sooner you can get to the making, the better.<\/p>\nUsing Technology to Engage Visitors<\/h2>\n
MH: Tell us about Gallery One at the Cleveland Museum of Art.<\/strong><\/p>\nNathan:<\/b> Gallery One was created to address the need of making this museum a destination and opening it up to new audiences. \u00a0They were really serious about the project and doing something different. \u00a0They originally thought it was a good idea to put iPads in front of all the artwork, but we cautioned against that. \u00a0We\u2019re in love with museums and storytelling and people and experience. \u00a0Usually, we can find technology that heightens that, but we don\u2019t think it has to be more technology all the time.<\/p>\n
View Gallery One in the video below:<\/i><\/p>\n