How do you transcend physical space to tell a virtual story?

Problem Space

To envision a virtual experience that captures the life and work of Roberto Clemente, our team knew we needed to understand how his story is told today. What makes the Clemente Museum, and similar experiences, compelling and engaging? We wanted to understand how artifacts live in museums, and how people connect to the stories behind them.

Why roberto Clemente?

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Background

What Makes a Museum?

Physical museums and where the Clemente Museum is today
Discuss our research through interviews to understand the current state of museums and the Clemente museum
Key insights and evidence
Background

Why Roberto Clemente?

Beyond Clemente's 3,000 career hits. Beyond being a World Series champion, twice. Roberto Clemente stands as a symbol of Latin American pride, having been the first Latin American to rise to stardom in the world of baseball. As a Black man, he abhorred the racism people of color endured, denouncing segregation and hosting Martin Luther King, Jr. on his farm in Puerto Rico.
Roberto Clemente, a proud Puerto Rican, devoted his life to humanitarian work serving marginalized communities in the United States and Latin America. Ultimately, he gave his life to his work, when he died on a plane destined to deliver supplies to victims of a devastating Nicaraguan earthquake.
Beyond Clemente's 3,000 career hits. Beyond being a World Series champion, twice. Roberto Clemente's work as a humanitarian, serving marginalized communities in the United States and Central America, made him a symbol of Latin American pride. He dedicated his life to it. He gave his life for it.
His dedication to the underserved and unwavering defiance of racism is relevant today more than ever. We want to share his legacy, in hopes of inspiring the next generation of community leaders and heroes.
Roberto Clemente dedicated his life to humanitarian work, becoming a symbol of Latin American pride by serving marginalized communities in the US and Central America. His unwavering defiance of racism and discrimination is relevant today more than ever. We want to share his legacy, in hopes of inspiring the next generation of community leaders and heroes.
Learn more

Why Roberto Clemente?

Beyond Clemente's 3,000 career hits. Beyond being a World Series champion, twice. Roberto Clemente stands as a symbol of Latin American pride, having been the first Latin American to rise to stardom in the world of baseball. As a Black man, he abhorred the racism people of color endured, denouncing segregation and hosting Martin Luther King, Jr. on his farm in Puerto Rico.
Roberto Clemente, a proud Puerto Rican, devoted his life to humanitarian work serving marginalized communities in the United States and Latin America. Ultimately, he gave his life to his work, when he died on a plane destined to deliver supplies to victims of a devastating Nicaraguan earthquake.
Beyond Clemente's 3,000 career hits. Beyond being a World Series champion, twice. Roberto Clemente's work as a humanitarian, serving marginalized communities in the United States and Central America, made him a symbol of Latin American pride. He dedicated his life to it. He gave his life for it.
His dedication to the underserved and unwavering defiance of racism is relevant today more than ever. We want to share his legacy, in hopes of inspiring the next generation of community leaders and heroes.
Roberto Clemente dedicated his life to humanitarian work, becoming a symbol of Latin American pride by serving marginalized communities in the US and Central America. His unwavering defiance of racism and discrimination is relevant today more than ever. We want to share his legacy, in hopes of inspiring the next generation of community leaders and heroes.
Learn more
What makes a museum?

Current State

(Primary Research, 2021)

Semi-structured interviews
Artifact analysis
To surface what makes museums compelling and engaging, we spoke to young adults who have visited museums and patrons of the Clemente Museum. These semi-structured interviews, along with our own in-person visit to the museum, let us develop a map that consolidates the core museum principles most relevant to the Clemente Museum.

Analogous Domains

(Primary Research, 2021)

Semi-structured interviews
We also reached out to museum professionals, including experience designers, managers, and curators ranging from the Latin American Studies Association (LASA) to The Met. Combined with various team visits to Pittsburgh museums, we built our corpus of universal elements of compelling museums.
"Tell the story, either from [Clemente's] perspective or someone else's perspective, so it's more about narrative." - Kevin Park

"If you have a great story and an amazing character...it’s worth creating a link with the present, especially if you want to connect with youth." - Valentina Nisi

Current State

(Primary Research, 2021)

Semi-structured interviews
Artifact analysis
To surface what makes museums compelling and engaging, we spoke to young adults who have visited museums and patrons of the Clemente Museum. These semi-structured interviews, along with our own in-person visit to the museum, let us develop a map that consolidates the core museum principles most relevant to the Clemente Museum.

Analogous Domains

(Primary Research, 2021)

Semi-structured interviews
We also reached out to museum professionals, including experience designers, managers, and curators ranging from the Latin American Studies Association (LASA) to The Met. Combined with various team visits to Pittsburgh museums, we built our corpus of universal elements of compelling museums.
"Tell the story, either from [Clemente's] perspective or someone else's perspective, so it's more about narrative." - Kevin Park

"If you have a great story and an amazing character...it’s worth creating a link with the present, especially if you want to connect with youth." - Valentina Nisi
During the synthesis of our conversations and excursions, we deconstructed recurring themes using an affinity map and forged key insights from them. These insights, while inspired by the current state of the Clemente Museum and museums like it, are ubiquitous in their application in a virtual space.
During the synthesis of our conversations and excursions, we deconstructed recurring themes using an affinity map and forged key insights from them. These insights, while inspired by the current state of the Clemente Museum and museums like it, are ubiquitous in their application in a virtual space.
How do we
take Clemente virtual?

Opportunity Spaces

With our primary research, we saw that the most fundamental aspect to our type of museum experience is rich, relatable storytelling and discussion. Since our challenge is to deliver these stories remotely and virtually, we began building and testing pretotypes to test how we could combine interactive virtual elements with rich storytelling.

Exploring Virtual Exhibits
in Minecraft

(Generative Research 2021)

Pretotyping
To observe how people engage with museum-like virtual spaces, our team turned to one of the quickest rapid prototyping tools we could think of: Minecraft!

We crafted different rooms with artifacts, each with a different combination of narration and interactivity, letting people touch and move artifacts as well as trigger stories about them. Even in this blocky, low-fidelity world, people were hesitant to interact with the space and artifacts during our interviews. They brought with them the social inhibitions of real-world museums, even without consequences.
“When I knocked over the [virtual artifact], it felt as if I had done something wrong. I had to get out of there.”

“This place makes me feel like ‘look, but don’t touch.’”

Fostering Virtual Discussion

(Generative Research 2021)

Pretotyping
To deepen our exploration of how people might engage with virtual exhibits, we drew on inspiration by an integral behavior noted in our primary research: 7 out of 8 of those interviewed noted they favored going to museums with friends, and talking about what they experienced.
‍
To preserve that less tangible but key aspect of museum visitation, we created a pretotype that offered a space for both live and asynchronous reflection and commenting over a shared multimedia experience.

Opportunity Spaces

With our primary research, we saw that the most fundamental aspect to our type of museum experience is rich, relatable storytelling and discussion. Since our challenge is to deliver these stories remotely and virtually, we began building and testing pretotypes to test how we could combine interactive virtual elements with rich storytelling.

Exploring Virtual Exhibits
in Minecraft

(Generative Research 2021)

Pretotyping
To observe how people engage with museum-like virtual spaces, our team turned to one of the quickest rapid prototyping tools we could think of: Minecraft!

We crafted different rooms with artifacts, each with a different combination of narration and interactivity, letting people touch and move artifacts as well as trigger stories about them. Even in this blocky, low-fidelity world, people were hesitant to interact with the space and artifacts during our interviews. They brought with them the social inhibitions of real-world museums, even without consequences.
“When I knocked over the [virtual artifact], it felt as if I had done something wrong. I had to get out of there.”

“This place makes me feel like ‘look, but don’t touch.’”

Fostering Virtual Discussion

(Generative Research 2021)

Pretotyping
To deepen our exploration of how people might engage with virtual exhibits, we drew on inspiration by an integral behavior noted in our primary research: 7 out of 8 of those interviewed noted they favored going to museums with friends, and talking about what they experienced.
‍
To preserve that less tangible but key aspect of museum visitation, we created a pretotype that offered a space for both live and asynchronous reflection and commenting over a shared multimedia experience.
By generating these pretotypes, our team was able to observe how people engage with rich storytelling offered in virtual spaces rather than a physical museum. Using a (massive) affinity map and abstraction laddering, we developed a deeper understanding in the form of our insights.
By generating these pretotypes, our team was able to observe how people engage with rich storytelling offered in virtual spaces rather than a physical museum. Using a (massive) affinity map and abstraction laddering, we developed a deeper understanding in the form of our insights.
Designing for a legacy

Solution Criteria

Our research materialized the design directions crucial for a meaningful Roberto Clemente experience, made interactive and virtual to engage a broader and younger audience than ever before.
1
Feature cohesive themes that connect Roberto's stories and artifacts with rich storytelling.
Present the space, artifacts, and stories in a way that encourages active interaction, not passive observation.
2
3
Couple content with appropriate mediums, each offering a new layer of information to build on one another.
Build spaces for anonymous, multimedia reflections on stories and exhibits, and enable interaction with others' reflections asynchronously.
4

Solution Criteria

Our research materialized the design directions crucial for a meaningful Roberto Clemente experience, made interactive and virtual to engage a broader and younger audience than ever before.
1
Feature cohesive themes that connect Roberto's stories and artifacts with rich storytelling.
Present the space, artifacts, and stories in a way that encourages active interaction, not passive observation.
2
3
Couple content with appropriate mediums, each offering a new layer of information to build on one another.
Build spaces for anonymous, multimedia reflections on stories and exhibits, and enable interaction with others' reflections asynchronously.
4
CMU MHCI x CLEMENTE MUSEUM 2021