Judge's comments:

A clever and creative project that explores interdisciplinary collaboration between art, architecture in both the virtual and physical realms with a ‘pop-up’ street installation testing the user experience beyond both the gallery and the two-dimensional screen.
This project is a playful exploration of the future role and form of gallery space - explored at 1:1 utilising AR. The resultant project not only redefines how art can be shared and displayed - it also creates a fun and engaging piece of civic placemaking.

Description:

The physical presence and spatial configuration of art galleries have always been an important part of experiencing artworks. The Augmented Gallery proposes and investigates an alternative strategy of having a pop-up gallery space, allowing the artist to exhibit their work as a hybrid form.

The Augmented Gallery is a hybrid exhibition space that combines virtual art forms with the three-dimensional physical environment, specifically through using augmented reality (AR) technology on mobile devices. This research project investigates the design parameter and the user experiences of hybrid gallery spaces. It questions how artists and architects could work collaboratively in the design and creation of the spatial environment. What are the new functionalities of the Augmented Gallery? And how do we create a satisfying and entertaining user experience in this gallery space?

The project collaborated with three New Zealand based artists to develop and construct the Augmented Gallery as 1:1 applied experimentation. It involved both the design of the physical gallery space and the integration of virtual art forms. The artists’ works were transformed into virtual elements that augment the physical gallery space. Using portable augmented reality devices – mobile phones and tablets, the visitor can simultaneously engage with the physical and digital art forms. Iterative experiments were conducted during the design process to optimise this user experience and create a cohesive gallery space.

The investigations conducted in this research combine both architectural and artistic thinking. This research project critically evaluates both the opportunities as well as limitations of the augmented gallery space. The interdisciplinary collaboration between art and architecture has helped spark new ideas for both the artists and architectural designers. In this case, the user experiences of virtual art are no longer bound to a two-dimensional screen, but are extended and integrated as part of the augmented gallery itself. This hybrid form of gallery enhances the connection between digital art and the physical gallery space. In doing so, it challenges us to rethink architectural design and the new functionalities of future gallery spaces.