Looking at my past works, I realise I tend to construct 3-dimensional projects with interactive elements.
Overview of my portfolio works
My portfolio works
The element of play is evident in my work and I wanted that to be the highlight of my portfolio. Hence, the motives and overall editorial design was chosen on the idea of ‘form + play’
Ideas for my portfolio
In the end, I choose to go with the booklet form but used lively colours to convey the idea of fun and interactivity.
Through the brainstorming exercise, I realise that I would love to design for interactive materials in the context of a museum. To scope my project, I started to look into the different areas where visual communication could be applied in the museum. Some of the areas I had explored:
Information accessibility in museum
Community museums/ Private museums
Participatory projects in museum
01 Accessibility
02 Community Museums
03 Participatory Project
I decided to delve into 1#1 Information Accessibility in Museums and consider the different possible community groups to work with.
Dyslexic children – most exhibits are contextual heavy and description are often heavily reliant on texts, making it unwelcoming for dyslexic children.
Visitors with time constraint – based on the 2017 Survey Population on the Arts, lack of time was the most common factor for not participation in arts & heritage events.
Eventually, I decided to work on designing a children’s exhibition guide for National Gallery’s DBS Singapore Gallery – Siapa Nama Kamu. This is one of the 2 permanent exhibition that covers artworks about Singapore from the 18th century to contemporary times.
Reason #1: I like designing educational materials for kids.
Reason #2: I remember guiding a Korean family with 3 young daughters for this exhibition- while the parents were fully engaged, the children were fidgety as the tour was not age-appropriate for them.
The Gallery does provide children-friendly tours/events for children to learn more about the artworks. However, I realise many of these events require parents make an extra effort to stay updated with the museum schedule and and abide to the tour timings. This is not a luxury all families have especially visitors from abroad.
Hence, I decided to do a museum guide that fits the following criteria:
Only pencil can be used for the activities (museum rules)
Children can use the exhibition guide without much supervision:
Language is kept simple; contextual knowledge are kept concise
Many visual guides to engage children
Various tactile materials to keep things fresh
I had decided on the following 6 artworks as they do not require much contextual knowledge, display a variety of mediums and cover the major period of Singapore’s art development.
Heinrich Leutemann
Unterbrochene Straßenmessung auf Singapore (Interrupted Road Surveying in Singapore)
c. 1865
Wood engraving
20.8 x 29.4 cm
Collection of National Museum of Singapore
Singapore
Liu Kang
Life by the River
1975
Oil on canvas
126 x 203 cm
Gift of the artist. Collection of National Gallery Singapore.
Singapore
Chua Mia Tee National Language Class 1959 Oil on canvas 112 x 153 cm Collection of National Gallery Singapore Singapore
Teo Eng Seng The Net: Most Definitely The Singapore River 1986 Paperdyesculp and net Gift of the artist. Collection of National Gallery Singapore. Singapore
Choy Weng Yang. Horizontals I. 1977. Oil on canvas. Gift of the artist. Collection of National Gallery Singapore.
Matthew Ngui
Walks Through a Chair
1997 remade 2015
Mixed media, video approx. 00:03:00
Collection of National Gallery Singapore
Singapore
These are the ideation and sketches for each artwork.
And to anyone who was curious to how I created the holes for ‘The Net’ activity page – I used a Making Memories Hole Punch I found in my old stash of scrapbooking materials.