VR-Xebit: learning through setting up an art gallery exhibition in Virtual Reality.
The project aims to create a new experience in the municipal Art Gallery of Chania, Crete, Greece implemented through the technology of Virtual Reality (VR). Within the framework of an art exhibition inspired by and dedicated to modern Greek history. The goal is to eperiment with a new approach of getting in touch with the gallery and the artwork, through an interactive virtual experience that exploits digitization and3D mapping, highlighting the cultural content of the exhibition.
National
Greece
Municipality of Chania
It addresses urban-rural linkages
It refers to other types of transformations (soft investment)
No
No
Yes
As a representative of an organisation
Name of the organisation(s): Digital Media Lab Type of organisation: University or another research institution First name of representative: Panagiotis Last name of representative: Parthenios Gender: Male Nationality: Greece Function: Professor of Digital Technologies in Architectural Design, Director of the Lab Address (country of permanent residence for individuals or address of the organisation)<br/>Street and number: Technical University Of Crete Campus Town: Chania Postal code: 73100 Country: Greece Direct Tel:+30 693 690 0881 E-mail:pparthenios@tuc.gr Website:https://dmlab.tuc.gr
VR-Xebit is a new, innovative approach to getting in touch with an art gallery and the artwork, through an interactive virtual experience that exploits digitization and 3D mapping, highlighting the cultural content of the exhibition, implemented through the technology of Virtual Reality (VR). In a digital clone of a real setting in a virtual environment within a VR application, where with the help of Virtual Glasses the user is immersed, in the necessary tools to interact and co-create the virtual setting. In this way, VR-Xebit offers the opportunity for the visitor to get to know the place and the artwork, promoting her/his active participation in the project in setting up the exhibition and acquiring knowledge about the artwork through a task-based learning approach. Simultaneously,
Therefore, the project manages a) to build a cultural awareness strategy for the visitors by allowing them to read/learn about each work and its real history, b) to promote capacity-building processes related to the exhibition installations, (reflect on the colors, lighting, space, relationships of the works), c) to actually transform virtually the exhibition space through participatory processes, d) familiarize with digital tools, that allow for an experiential learning e) disseminate art everywhere and to f) create a virtual community of learners that interact, co-create spaces and share ideas and culture. As a digital tool, it has the capacity to be implemented in any place with no geographical or technical restrictions.
VR-Xebit was first launched to support the international exhibition “Greece after the Revolution: Art treasures from the Krasaki collection”, hosted at the Municipal Art Gallery of Chania in Crete and was funded by the Greek Ministry of Culture and Sports. 86 schools visited the Art Gallery and had the opportunity to test the VR-Xebit, interact with the art material not only passively through a catalog but in an active way through participation.
virtual reality
exhibit
art gallery
co-design
educate
VR-Xebit is an exemplary way not only to educate, and empower users to be part or to exchange ideas and knowledge with any art and cultural community, Art Galleries, students and schools, but also a way to promote sustainability.
Specifically, through the VR application we create an immersive experience that promotes virtual tours and facilitates virtual events, reducing the need for physical presence and reducing the environmental impact associated with traveling by plane and by car or bus. In this way we achieve significant savings of C02 emissions and therefore educe the carbon footprint associated with physical gatherings, promoting sustainability.
Secondly, the VR-Xebit can be used to preserve cultural heritage and tradition that may be at risk of being lost or forgotten. In this way, users become members of an active virtual community with historical traits and artworks, promoting cultural thus sustainability. The specific tool can be used to educate and raise awareness not only about the culture and the art but also about sustainable practices and lifestyles, promoting a sense of social and environmental responsibility among diverse communities.
By encouraging interdisciplinary collaboration and promoting exchange of ideas and perspectives, VR-Xebit can support sustainable design: It fosters the development of new technologies, products, and services that are more environmentally friendly by saving materials, unnecessary printings and raw materials. Also with VR we avoid trials and remarks on plaster walls and on wood stands.
Lastly, with VR-Xebit students and visitors get empowered with the use of digital tools, understand their value, an element that assists in the digital transition of any community.
With VR-Xebit users (tourists and students) can come really close, they can touch, an art artifact, a painting, a sculpture. They can actually grab it and move it around in order to place it to their preferred spot (whereas in the real world you are not allowed neither to come close nor to touch a piece of art).
Different versions of setups for the artifacts allows the students to understand deeper the essence of each piece and correlate it with its history, environment, time and place it was created, its creator, social and political background, in order to make a decision of where and how it should be displayed.
Moreover, students can have full scale developments of their proposals in plan view and facade views, further deepening the quality of their experience both culturally and spatially.
Different scenarios regarding light design, colors and materials can be explored in the VR platform. In the physical world only a few alternatives can be tested due to time and material limitations.
With VR-Xebit students and visitors get empowered with the use of digital tools, understand their value, an element that assists in the digital transition of any community.
Lastly, users and students acquire a sense of belonging and cultural pride among the communities who are connected to these cultural elements, while also promoting cultural sustainability. Through the possibility of a virtual online remote connection with other communities of students and backgrounds, people have the chance to share a common aesthetic and experiential experience, creating therefore the ground for a spin off to other settings.
Designing and experiencing an art exhibition on Virtual Reality opens up in terms of inclusion into different age, cultural and local groups, otherwise almost impossible to travel in order to visit an exhibition which usually lasts only a couple of weeks and then gets dismantled. Students from isolated villages, which do not have the financial means or the luxury to spend money to visit an art exhibition, can now not only see the exhibition but participate in setting it up. Students with disabilities do not have to overcome mobility difficulties.
Inclusion also has to do with reconnecting students from different isolated places with their classmates from mainland or privileged large cities or private schools and bringing their voice up, making them heard. It promotes equality, inclusion, collaboration.
VR-Xbit gave schools and classes a sense of belonging. They felt they were part of a team that had a chance to create their own reading and design proposal of the exhibition, bringing it out to the world and comparing it to other school's creations, many times engaging them in a creative dialog amongst them. Also it highlighted something very important in cultural events, the continuity after the visit.
Having tested VR-Xebit in the Municipal Gallery of Chania, Crete, we were surprised by the results and by how overwhelmingly it was embraced by the schools not only of the specific city but from all over the whole island (Crete has a population of 620,000). Once a few elementary schools visited the exhibition and participated in the VR platform the word was spread immediately and there were hundreds of requests from schools all over the country. Also the curators of the exhibition highlighted the difference the students showed in terms of interest and involvement through the VR-Xebit tool versus the traditional experience physically walking around and pathetically looking at the artifacts -without really paying attention, and never reading the notes next to each artifact.
VR-Xbit brought students closer to cultural activities and also gave them a sense of belonging. They felt they were part of a team, that has a chance to create their own reading and design proposal of the exhibition, brining it out to the world and compare it to other school's creations, many times engaging them in a creative dialog amongst them. Also it highlighted something very important in cultural events, the continuity after the visit.
Now more schools from all over the country have expressed interest in using VR-Xbit, and also educational institutions from abroad especially from Greek speaking communities, Hellenic Diaspora (USA, Canada, Australia) who would never had the chance of visiting the physical exhibition and they also are looking for ways to reconnect with their roots.
The Municipal Art Gallery of Chania order the creation of VR-Xbit platform as part of a larger toolkit for the digital enhancement of the “Greece after the Revolution – Art Treasures from the Krasaki Collection” exhibition, which was implemented by The Technical University of Crete. The Municipality of Chania had a key role in the implementation of the initiative, and also the Prefecture of Crete who embraced the initiative. The exhibition was under the auspices of her excellency the President of the Hellenic Republic, Katerina Sakellaropoulou.
The exhibition is accompanied by an illustrated catalogue (380 pages) (in three different editions in Greek, English and German) with texts by the art historian and curator of the collections of the Greek Parliament Thodoris Koutsogiannis, the author Katerina Schina, the writer and journalist Nikos Psilakis, historian-researcher Eftychis Tzirtzilakis, the curator of the exhibition Dimitris Andreadakis, the President of the Hellenic Republic, Katerina Sakellaropoulou, the Mayor of Chania Panagiotis Simandirakis and the Deputy Mayor of Culture and President of the Municipal Art Gallery Giannis Giannakakis.
The 167 exhibits belong to the 1,500 objects comprising the Tina and Michalis Krasakis Collection, which is based in Cologne, Germany and is presented for the first time to the public; and in Crete, which is the birthplace of the collector and journalist of Deutsche Welle, Michalis Krasakis.
The final project of this VR application is a reflection of many different fields with the pursuit of a significant co-working method and the sharing of their knowledge in order to achieve the best result. The application concerns an Art gallery and thus the contribution of the art curator was significant in order to understand the process of how we set up an art exhibition. This knowledge was transferred to architects and to computer engineers in order to create a background for our initiative. The analysis of the space gave the opportunity to the curator to set up virtually the exhibit before the final set up, as well as to better communicate with the art historian for a well structured and documented art exhibition. The results of their work were shared with a graphic designer, who had the opportunity to add the details about the description of every exhibit and also the creation of texts that describe in the best way the sense of the exhibition. In this way, a team of 3D modelers and virtual reality experts, made a virtual copy of the place and every exhibit in order to create the VR and the AR application. With all this information they created a frame with the right description and the right depiction in every technology that they used. The collaboration with the owners of the exhibits was very important as well as the cooperation with the staff of the Art Gallery.
The VR-Xebit has a strong innovative character that can be understood through its scalability and use.
Firstly, VR-Xebit can be a useful tool for all exhibitions' curators. Normally, an Art Gallery hosts continuous exhibitions, thus the space is full for a long period. The curator through VR-Xebit can study his setup long before finalization and take decisions with metric accuracy, thus avoiding construction and economic challenges.
Secondly, with the use of VR-Xebit, the whole visiting experience expands to include details that previously were not available. For the first time the user can virtually touch and re-scale the artworks, in order to better appreciate the value of the exhibits and even small details that maybe can be unnoticed in a quick visit. Users have also the ability to intervene in the set up of the exhibits as well as in the coloring of the walls and the arrangement of the whole place. Additionally, VR-Xebit allows for collaborations digitally, sharing of experiences, empowering communities of users with different cultures and beliefs. Each users’ work footprint can last for long terms and become an inspiration for other users transforming the whale process into an educational activity.
The disembodied experience that follows the work wot the VR-Xebit allows for less environmental damage, with no installation costs. Moreover, the virtual exhibition prevents the exhibits from serious damage that can be provoked during transportation. Thus, when using the VR-Xebit, the collectors can present their treasures more often and safely.
One more innovative characteristic is the maintenance of the exhibition in time. The 3D scanning of the configured environment which hosts the exhibition and all the exhibits, integrated in the VR-Xebit,allows one to create an archive of every event which is available at any time, a catalog of all the exhibits and a virtual library, useful for future projects.
The technology behind the VR-Xebit does not require major expertise on behalf of the users, and thus can be easily used by different actors, in any institutions, cities and countries. Among the various tools that are used in the VR-Xebit, 3D scanning can be done in every building, with no technical specificities. Thus we can scan other Galleries, museums and every other place where an exhibition can take place. Another important element of our project is the 3D scanning of the exhibits. Same as the places, we can scan the artworks of every exhibition. In this way, the idea of VR-Xebit can be replicated at all the places that host exhibitions of any kind.
Additionally, the educational role of the project can be transmitted to various groups besides students. The application can expand to higher education programs, for example in schools of arts and become a way to learn the culture, the history and the art of other regions or countries. Moreover, the application can be replicated to non-formal education, in the form of extra - curricular activities or youth work. Lastly, it is a very useful tool to fight digital inequalities based on gender, illiteracy, geographic location etc., as it is an all inclusive easy friendly tool.
The overall mission took place from June to October 2022. Firstly, the research group proceeded in 3D-scanning of the Municipal Gallery of Chania with the use of Matteport, which led to the creation of a 3Dmodel of the physical space in .obj. The model is a digital clone that was used as base for all members to work on. Also, the largest part of the exhibits was scanned and cataloged, thus creating a digital archive.Opened in Tilt Brush, the team could study, build the exhibition, decide the aesthetic approach, and then upload inside this model the digital clone of the artworks. Following this setup, the curator of the physical exhibition was able to decide on details-coloring, the exhibition concept of each floor-before the actual physical interventions. When the interior of the Gallery was finalized to host the exhibition, the empty but colored space of the Gallery was 3D scanned again. Through the updated 3D model, the curator finalized the position of each exhibit and the graphic designers, in turn, decided on details for their descriptions. In parallel, the team created a VR experience as an educational tool. The system was installed on-site. After the physical visit to the Gallery and the familiarization with the exhibits, the user can revisit it in a virtual space and compose his own virtual exhibition.Through the VR-Xebit, the user is able to walk through the virtual building, change the exhibit's position, scale them, ‘touch’ them, and better appreciate their color, shape, and value. At the end, the user can take pictures; video, or gif, into the Virtual environment; in order to save his setup. After the final setup, the team scanned the place anew. Lastly, the 3D scan after the installation of the exhibition was done in order to digitize the entire exhibition, thus offering a remote visit, by using only the link from the official website of the Art Gallery. All stored information on the history and description of the exhibit are available by selecting it.
The last two years our lives changed under the threat of a pandemic. Daily habits had to change and gatherings, travels and visitings to indoor places were forbidden. Even a simple visit to an Art Gallery in your region was not permissible, let alone in another area or country. So, we had a challenge to how we can overcome this unexpected situation not only in local terms but also globally. The contribution of VR-Xebit is undeniably great. Remote visiting is a known term long before the pandemic, but until then was not feasible in several fields. The benefit of VR-Xebit is its immersive ability. The user has the opportunity not only to admire the artworks but at the same time to be transferred virtually into the Art Gallery and in addition to become a part of the exhibition with his own contribution to the setup. Remote visiting can be beneficial not only for long distance visitors but also for the locals. Also, except for the pandemic difficulties, we had to take into consideration the difficulty of moving a whole school to an Art Gallery. A lot of interesting and important events take place in other cities or even countries and a great number of schools do not have the economic ability for long distance transportation. With the VR application can be parts of the culturals events without the cost and the responsibility to move from place to place. As a result, the VR-Xebit is an education tool which led to many solutions, with no one excluded from any activity in the field of cultural events.
The VR-Xebit was based on the exhibition “Greece after the Revolution: Art treasures from the Krasaki collection”, hosted at the Municipal Art Gallery of Chania in Crete, for 6 months. Into this period a lot of schools visited the place and got in touch with our project. The VR application was a pole of attraction for the students because it transformed a normal visit into an interactive experience. Through this interaction we noticed that the students left the building enriched by knowledge, satisfaction of participation and interest to visit more Art Galleries through VR-Xebit. The connection of new technologies with history became an interesting educational tool for the students. The next step is to carry out with VR-Xebit more exhibitions and spread them to more schools in other cities or even countries. Only with the use of Virtual Glasses, our application can be launched and travel the students to Galleries all over the world. The interaction is not limited between student and exhibition but also can be expanded between different students from different areas and schools, which are at the same time virtually in the Art Gallery. The exchange of opinion and knowledge about each artwork is our goal.
