FlowVellaMuseum Kiosk Perfected by FlowVella
A Background Appreciating Art & Museums
I’ll never forget when I was a teenager, living in NYC, in the 1980s. My dad was a doctor and had a few patients that were accomplished artists including an Italian modern (new wave) artist, Stefano Costronovo. He was famous in NYC for painting a four story neon green Mona Lisa on Bleeker Street and other murals, as well as painting on leather jackets as fashionable art. At an opening, at the Area nightclub, my parents and I were talking with Stefano when the artist turned, mid-sentence, and said, ‘Andy?!’. In walked a middle aged man with white hair and glasses, I knew right away that it was Andy Warhol. Stefano was thrilled that Andy had showed up to his opening and it was an honor to meet such an acclaimed and famous artist.
I’ve always appreciated art. Growing up in New York City made me a student to all things that broke open the edges of what was expected or what had been done before. My mother has been a docent at the Whitney Museum for over 20 years where I have been lucky to see amazing artists and exhibits (Hopper, O’Keef, etc.) throughout my years into adulthood. My parents appreciation for art turned our childhood home into a ‘museum’ of Northwest Coast and Inuit art with Edward Curtis portraits along with modern art pieces. One of my favorite classes at my alma mater, Lehigh University, was 20th Century Modern Art where we were ‘forced’ to visit MOMA.
First Launches of FlowVella as a Museum Kiosk
Fast forward to this past 12 months and FlowVella has been gaining momentum and adoption as an effective interactive museum kiosk. Last June, Forrest Gibson at EMP Museum reached out to us about the potential to help with the “We Are 12” exhibit, celebrating the Seahawks Superbowl victory. We were sworn to secrecy of the coming project and proceeded. We were in the midst of building the ability to take any ‘flow’ and turn into a standalone iPad app. EMP Museum and “We Are 12” launched in October, 2014 as our first production release of a FlowVella standalone app as a museum kiosk. EMP was so thrilled that just a few weeks later, FlowVella was used in a second exhibit, Indie Game Revolution.
Why FlowVella as an Interactive Museum Kiosk?
We’re glad you asked…
They are several macro benefits in utilizing interactive kiosks as a means to effectively communicate information in modern times. There is a cultural shift where growing numbers of the population expects to interact with information digitally, and with touch, voice, gestures, or other modern ways to interact with content and information.
FlowVella is a compelling tool for kiosks because its apps and platform have been purpose built for iPad from the beginning. You compose 100% customizable interactive stories with free authoring tools for the Mac and iPad. You can build engaging stories or interactive information with videos, image galleries, text and more that work offline and flawlessly. FlowVella has a convenient updating mechanism which allows content to stay current with ease. And, each FlowVella kiosk app is an individual iPad app, enabling best practices for security and maintenance.
Next Stage of for FlowVella and the Museum Kiosk Solution
As just covered in this story on Fast Company, FlowVella is powering the interactive museum kiosks at the Smithsonian’s Star Wars: Power of Costume traveling exhibit. EMP Museum is the premiere destination for this exhibit and it will travel the world through 2019, and will be utilizing FlowVella museum kiosks for the whole run.
Visitors dive deeper into the history and background of the development and design of the costumes and props for the Star Wars franchise. There are image galleries, video and audio clips and text narrative that allows the curious to learn more than is displayed on the placards. You can hear Darth Vader’s iconic breathing audio clip and there are short video clips from several of the films to see the costumes in action.
Last month, FlowVella, was a sponsor of the Smithsonian Affiliations conference in Washington, DC. There are over 200 Smithsonian affiliated museums, almost all in the US. The conference is meant to bring together representatives of the Smithsonian and Smithsonian Affiliated museums to show new programs, exhibits and collections, as well as instructional sessions and hands-on workshops. Attendees were also treated to behind-the-scenes tours, but the best part of the conference was the sharing of learnings and best practices from the Smithsonian to the affiliates and vice versa. FlowVella had the opportunity to introduce our product to over 130 attendees from over 80 museums and learn their needs and requirements for interactive displays.
We will be announcing our next museum, science center and aquarium launches soon as we are now working with several others. We will continue to look to our museum partners and their visitors to give us feedback and direction on new features and functionality, so we can iterate FlowVella’s museum kiosk platform to become the standard for all museums.
And now, any FlowVella user, is using the same tools, ‘museum-quality presentation software‘, that the top museums and brands in the world use to share information in an engaging and interactive way.