How did our ancestors live, feel and think 300,000 years ago? Were they just as human as you and me?

New seating options in the centre of the permanent exhibition create a place of communication and are bringing visitors to eye level with the paper dioramas, which show us about the everyday life of original families. Due to their light weight, they are practical to use and when stacked, the top surfaces become colored seat cushions for the bench on the horse base.
Sensory boxes, coherent to the seating cubes bring special scenes from the diorama to life and invite you to take a closer look. The cheerful coloring of the various elements expands the previous design language of the museum with varied accents. All contact surfaces are covered with soft fleece.

The new focus on perceiving the exhibition with all your senses creates communicative impulses, extraordinary experiences and memories to pass on.

In collaboration with Frieda Adam and Leonie Kock  I  Study project From Once To Today To Tomorrow - Explorations on the spatial communication of living science  I  Coordinated by Prof. Rita Rentzsch  I  Artistic member of staff Janna Nikoleit  I  A project cooperation with «Forschungsmuseum Schöningen»

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The assignment was to explore future-oriented ways of museum education to complement the permanent exhibition of the «Forschungsmuseum Schöningen» and to develop an innovative intervention for a selected target group. The concept was tested in a field trial at the museum using a mock-up and the results were incorporated into the design.

The «Forschungsmuseum Schöningen» houses many cultural assets such as original bone finds and hunting weapons. At the centre of the permanent exhibition, which is called "marketplace", there is an artistic-poetic narrative in the form of several paper dioramas illustrating the lives of our ancestors.

Unfortunately, the existing dioramas, including the infographics placed above them, are difficult to comprehend and therefore do not receive the desired attention. The overlooked knowledge manifests itself in the visitors' lack of interest in the actual main protagonist of the exhibition, Homo Heidelbergensis. In addition, the cold atmosphere of the large room does not invite visitors to linger and explore, so that no emotional connection to our ancestors can develop. This lack of communication between people and research, visitors and the exhibition results in a decimated audience. We counteract this problem by connecting the visitor and the Homo Heidelbergensis through tactical, olfactory and sound sensations, active search missions and intriguing questions, while providing comfortable seats in order to be able to take time thinking of our simularities between us and our ancestors.

During the design process we experimented with different materials and object shapes and eventually realised the final design of the seating cubes and sensory boxes in one-to-one models.