Outreach Potential of Displaying Research Artifacts in Art Museums

This paper explores how displaying engineering research artifacts in art museums can facilitate expanded outreach opportunities. A combination of visual art and innovative engineering offers an unusual opportunity to engage a wide spectrum of society. To evaluate the potential, faculty and students collaborated with the Brigham Young University Museum of Art to create a museum exhibition that connected the art of origami to engineering, math, science, and product design. A framework is introduced that includes the creation of a museum exhibition; and once the initial investment is made to create the central exhibition, the results are efficiently used to extend outreach efforts through first-generation products (coincident with the exhibition) and then through second-generation products (after the exhibition). The paper describes a detailed example of this framework and provides evidence to support the concept that displaying research artifacts in an art museum can expand research opportunities. Products from the exhibition that provided expanded outreach opportunities include the following: an exhibit catalog originally created for the gift shop that was expanded for publication with a national publisher; a tablet/smart phone app that includes origami instructions followed by related engineering activities, which has had broad use beyond the museum activity room; a video that was prepared for museum patrons but has since been made available to larger audiences; materials created for hands-on museum activities that were used for outreach activities after the exhibition; and leverage for industry visits that led to additional applications and research projects. This paper describes the museum exhibition, the firstand second-generation products, the impact of each product, and the benefits and pitfalls of using a museum exhibition to extend outreach impact.