The National Gallery in London and King’s College London have jointly launched a collaborative research & development (R&D) programme called National Gallery X (NGX) to explore how new and experimental technologies might create new types of museum experiences.
Based in a new studio next to the gallery, NGX will host residencies and events where artists and creatives can explore how technological inventions can be applied to cultural institutions in the future, informing new kinds of cultural experiences. The gallery’s collection and the university’s research will provide key inspiration for the work that comes out of the studio.
“What will the museum of the future look like and how will technology been integrated into it? NGX will allow us to explore these fascinating and fundamental questions with some very smart partners, academics, artists, curators and technological innovators,” said Gabriele Finaldi, the director of the National Gallery.
Evelyn Welch, the provost and senior vice president of arts and sciences at King’s College London, said: “NGX will build on our creative collaborations at the intersection of culture, the digital creative industries and King’s research, allowing students and researchers to think differently and critically about art and the ways we access and engage with it.”
The scheme launched last month with a new composition by the composer Peter Wiegold, created in response to JMW Turner’s Rain, Steam, Speed painting, which uses sound design by Keir Vine and immersive spatial audio technologies developed by Zoran Cvetkovic from King’s department of infomatics.
The first residency will start in early 2020, when the art collective Analema takes over the studio to explore how colours used in the National Gallery’s collection can be turned into sound. The project will draw on mathematical and technical research carried out by King’s academics.
The second residency with the Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art will explore how emerging mobility and telecommunications technologies might create new kinds of physical access to museums for diverse, disabled and neuro-diverse audiences.
