By Lucia Marengo, Queen Mary University of London, UK, George Fazekas, QMUL, UK The digitization of art collections is a great opportunity to engage audiences beyond the context of the museum visit. Interfaces to access collections have been initially tailored for professional search tasks: the new challenge is how to design systems for open, casual, and leisure-based explorations. In a human-centered framework, the users' perspective is a fundamental step to design and improve creative solutions. How can we listen to and understand the potential users, in order to design meaningful experiences? How can we collect insights, and what do these tell us about the users and the systems? We explore the use of inquiry techniques as a method to surface the curiosities people have for paintings. During two iterations, visitors of public events wrote questions they had about selected paintings. 138 Post-its were collected and thematically analyzed. Results highlight that curiosities are contextualized, and that artworks are interpreted mainly as scenes. People are interested in meanings and symbols; they also displayed the use of fantasy and empathy. Additionally, we evaluated the effect of age, previous knowledge of the painting, and frequency of visiting museums on the questions' content through statistical analysis. While no strong finding emerged, we noticed that adults and kids likewise display an active role in the inquiry process, and that a previous knowledge of the painting is connected to more descriptive and atomic curiosities. In the discussion, we suggest design opportunities might lay in the interactive discovery of information, in storytelling-based descriptions, and in emotional connection. Our findings suggest that in leisure-based explorations atomic information might not be satisfying, and that descriptions should be contextualized to the painting. Our presentation will be an opportunity to discuss the value of the method, and to comment on how the insights could be embedded into the design of leisure-based experiences.

1. I Wonder … Inquiry Techniques
As A Method To Gain Insights Into
People’s Encounters With Visual Art
Lucia Marengo, György Fazekas and Anastasios Tombros
Museums and the Web 2018
Vancouver Apr 20 2018

2. ‣ WHAT AM I INTERESTED IN
OPPORTUNITIES TO ENGAGE AUDIENCES
WITH ONLINE COLLECTIONS
IN LEISURE-BASED EXPERIENCES
HOW CAN WE ENGAGE USERS’ CURIOSITY IN THE
INTERACTION WITH PAINTINGS?

3. ‣ EXPLORATORY STUDY - AIM
LISTEN TO USERS AND UNDERSTAND THEIR PERSPECTIVE
(HUMAN-CENTRED APPROACH)
INSIGHTS
DESIGN
DECISIONS
PEOPLE

4. ‣ EXPLORATORY STUDY - METHODOLOGY
HOW
WHAT
INQUIRY TECHNIQUE:
from Harvard’s Project Zero on visible thinking
CURIOSITIES:
what do people want to know when they see a work of art?
what does the story in their mind look like?

5. ‣ EXPLORATORY STUDY - METHODOLOGY
Small gallery of prints (no info)
I wonder…post-its
Mixed controlled space
Post-experience questionnaire

6. ‣ STUDY - ITERATIONS
ITERATION 1
FESTIVAL OF COMMUNITIES
ITERATION 2
INTER/SECTIONS
Design: within-subject design
Paintings: 6 realist and surrealist,
living figures and their absence
Age: both adults and kids
STUDY DESIGN
PAINTING
SELECTION
AGE

7. ‣ STUDY - RESULTS and ANALYSIS STRATEGY
138 post-its
37 questionnaires
content analysis
statistical analysis (2nd)
INSIGHTS OPPORTUNITIES
LENSES
DATA

8. ‣ CONTENT ANALYSIS - WHAT DO PEOPLE ASK
what does the caption say?
what is going on?
DESCRIPTIONS
who is the woman?
when did this take place?

9. ‣ CONTENT ANALYSIS - WHAT DO PEOPLE ASK
is there a meaning
in the background
the artist has chosen?
is the painting trying to say something
or is it just attractive?
why Kahlo put her face
on a deer's body?
MEANING & SYMBOLS

10. ‣ CONTENT ANALYSIS - WHAT DO PEOPLE ASK
What was her life like?
What could I do if I were living in that palace?
I wonder who knocked over the bowl?
DOMAIN OF IMAGINATION

11. ‣ CONTENT ANALYSIS - WHAT DO PEOPLE ASK
What was used to paint this picture?
How big is this?
How was this done?
When is this painting from?
Is this impressionism?
Why is this painting so incredibly famous?
What goes through the artists mind when they painted this?
What inspired this?
What was happening in Kahlo's life when she painted this?
THE PHYSICAL OBJECT
THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT
THE ARTIST

12. IMAGE
Scene
Emotions
Myself in the scene
Elements IMPLICIT in the scene
Narrative around the scene
Descriptive
Reason/motivation for composition and appearance of scene
Artist
Background
Motivation
Ispiration
Mood
Physical object
Texture
Process
Size
Material
Historical context
Related events
Date
Provenance
Value
Place
Art movement / style
‣ CONTENT ANALYSIS - TAXONOMY
68.80%
8.70%
10.10%
10.90%
1.40%

13. ‣ CONTENT ANALYSIS - DIMENSIONS OF CURIOSITY
contribute: include interpretations or hp
one-word answers
self-reflective or open-ended
receive: informational questions
USER ROLE
COMPLEXITY
long, complex answers
SUBJECTS INVOLVED
other visitors or peers art experts or the museum
HOW DO PEOPLE ASK?

14. PAINTING SPECIFICITY
• Wounded Deer and The Starry Night: many questions about the author
REALISM
• 12.7% less active questions in paintings with no abstract or surreal element
• More questions about the scene if a surreal element is present
PRIOR KNOWLEDGE
• Active questions 14.4% more freq. with low to medium knowledge of the painting
STUDY DESIGN
• Imagination related elements appear only during the first iteration
AGE
• Adults submit 15.7% more descriptive questions than underage (p=0.016) *only including
meaning-related ones
‣ STATISTICAL ANALYSIS
NB
statistical
significance

15. • Could we provide information and narrative
closely related to each painting? (vs link /
general information about artist, period etc.)
• Could we provide rich, introductory and
fulfilling information to engage people with
little prior knowledge? How to do it
simultaneously including atomic descriptive
information for people with previous
knowledge?
• People are interested in contextual
information
• Little prior knowledge of the painting results
in less descriptive or specific questions and
in more general and meaning related ones.
‣ DISCUSSION OF THE RESULTS
INSIGHT OPPORTUNITY IN DESIGN FOR CURIOSITY

16. • Could we design an experience of
interactive discovery of information that
takes into account the users’ inputs?
• Could we support fictional dimension.
Maybe by designing playful contexts or
allowing non-“true” narratives?
• Interacting with information could be a
cognitively interactive activity. 26.1% of the
questions contained the users’ hp or idea,
among adults and kids alike
• People engage with fictional information,
but in the first iteration only - possibly due
to the co-presence of the activity with the
dice.
‣ DISCUSSION OF THE RESULTS
OPPORTUNITY IN DESIGN FOR CURIOSITYINSIGHT

17. THE METHOD ALLOWS TO
• derive a taxonomy of interests
• highlight other dimensions of curiosity (complexity, subject involved, user role)
• explore effect of previous knowledge, age, specific painting, context
LIMITATIONS
• no real context / real users
• are the questions a measure of curiosity?
DISCUSSION
• can it be replicated to know specific audiences’ interest?
• how can findings be used by designers in their practice?
‣ CONCLUSIONS

18. thank you!
contact: l.marengo@qmul.ac.uk