КА426
EUREGIO KARELIA: MUSEUM HYPERTEXT
INTERIM NARRATIVE REPORT
for the period 12.01.2013 – 11.03.2014
ACTIVITY 1. Launching days. Building teams of experts.
The project started on January 12, 2013 after the contract for the implementation of the project
was signed between the Joint Managing Authority of the Karelia ENPI CBC program and the
Creative Industries and Cultural Tourism Development Fund.
To facilitate the implementation of the project several teams were established, namely:
- a team of project experts;
- a team of Russian designers specializing in museum exhibitions, information environments and
web design;
- a team of Russian and Finnish engineers and technicians specializing in museum multimedia
and IT technologies.
In order to provide up-to-date information and news about the project two Facebook tools were
used: a community "Museum Hypertext - Euregio Karelia" was created at
www.facebook.com/museumhypertext to publish the basic information and a project's group was
created at http://www.facebook.com/groups/423484411078214/ for the instant feedback and
discussions.
A website for the project was created in April 2013 at http://project.museumhypertext.com with
information about the project, its participants and the key activities as well as the project's news,
photographs and documents from the implemented activities.
ACTIVITY 2. Holding an Opening Karelia workshop
On March 20-22, 2013 an Opening Karelia workshop was held in Petrozavodsk as a kick-off
project event in the Selena conference room of the Onego Palace hotel. Among the participants
were the project partners and associate partners, researchers, IT experts, and designers. The
workshop was conducted by Denis Kuznetsov, co-manager of the project. Art critic Georgy
Nikich (Moscow), museum expert Nickolai Nikishin (Moscow) and Helena Lonkila from the
University of Jyvaskyla, Finland were invited as experts. The three-day workshop program was
very intense with several experts' presentations, museums' introductions, work groups sessions,
discussions, game sessions and a visit to the National Museum of Karelia.
The first day of the workshop was devoted to broadening views on the Euregio Karelia region,
its outer and inner, state, administrative and other borders. The round table "Euregio Karelia:
positions, perspectives, introductions" gave start to the workshop. Experts from different fields
made their presentations and speeches on the following topics:
- "Karelia as an example of creating and projecting meanings" by Ilya Solomeshch, Ph.D. in
History, associate professor of the Department of history of countries of Northern Europe, head
of the Laboratory on the problems of the Scandinavian countries and Finland
During the presentation Karelia was introduced as a notion. Mr. Solomeshch explained how
different groups of people view Karelia and what meanings it has in terms of territories, people,
brands, and history.
- "Experiencing Karelianism" by Helena Lonkila, University of Jyvaskyla, Department of art and
culture studies
During the presentation Karelia was taken down to different meanings as something basic, as
points of entry, and as a reason to start thinking about the place of a human in the nature, about
the tight interaction between a human and nature, about the Karelia region as a unique and
valuable place and about the need to preserve the traditional culture.
The workshop proceeded with the group work on the following topics: Brands of the Euregio
Karelia region, Natural and geographical characteristics, Cultural landscape (ethnocultural
characteristics) and Historical destinies.
The task for Day 2 was to transfer the idea of hypertext from the regional level to particular
museums and their information environment created with exhibitions by:
- giving the description of the current exhibition of any participating museum not as the only
possible message to the visitors on the suggested theme but as a hypertext that allows the visitors
to read (identity, form) their own custom texts that carry various meanings;
- identifying available (and missing but necessary) hypertext elements in the system of
traditional museum exhibition such as interfaces, hyperlinks, information carriers, contexts,
meanings.
Later in the day the workshop participants visited the National Museum of the Republic of
Karelia to see the permanent exhibition and continue group work on the following themes:
- Transport routes of Karelia on both sides of the border:
- War history;
- Stone, mining, architecture;
- Ethnography and folklore.
Day 3 was devoted to revising current and preparing the terms of references for developing new
methods, instruments and technologies for creating an information environment of the Euregio
Karelia region as museum hypertext. The concept of the Opening Karelia game to be developed
in the project was also discussed.
Based on the work done during the workshop the participants suggested the following
requirements to the information system:
-
Behavior patterns of museum visitors and their locations should be taken into account;
The level of personalization should be quite high;
The system should be module-based;
The system should be open;
The system should have a possibility for other museums to join;
-
Integration with social networks in the internet should be provided.
The system should provide access to a maximum number of gadgets like touch screens,
information kiosks, personal computers, mobile devices. Internet access should be a must. QR
codes and other markers such as NFC (near field communication), geotracking, images, etc. are
preferable for using as markers. Light and sound installations, projectors, chargers for mobile
gadgets are also advisable. Augmented reality technology is suggested as a separate module.
The
-
-
-
participants
also
prepared
a
set
of
requirements
for
the
game:
The game should be quest-based (a tour of exhibitions and museums);
The game should virtually connect museums that are located relatively far away from each
other. The game is a sort of a portal to the museums. Therefore the game should have a
common concept and a style and, preferably, characters (same characters in all museums or
each museum has its own character);
The game should have different levels of complexity that determine formats and possibilities
for choosing a route;
Meanwhile the game should be easy-to-use and limited in technical means and information.
The players should get familiar with the game on their own and they should instinctively
understand it;
The game should be diverse with questions, puzzles, tasks, quests and possess interactive
and tactile features;
The reached goal of the game can be awarded with a prize, an award, a diploma, etc.
The game can be simple, i.e. targeted at getting acquainted with a particular museum in the form
of a quest/quiz/journey and being played by a visitor on his/her own. The game can go on and be
extended with visits to several museums or become more complicated when going from one
level to another.
The results of the workshop are:
During the workshop partnerships were established between the following museums:
- Regional museum of Northern Priladozhye, Sortavala and North Karelian Museum, Joensuu;
- Medvezhjegorsk regional museum and Joensuu bunkermuseum - Fighter's House, Ilomantsi;
- Cultural museum center, Kostomuksha and Outokumpu Mining Museum;
- National museum of the Republic of Karelia, North Karelian Museum and Regional museum of
Northern Priladozhye;
In the course of the workshop a whole range of issues was discussed, namely:
- general vision of the basic parameters of description and presentation of the Euregio Karelia
region as a multicultural, natural and historic phenomenon;
- the museum hypertext as a new approach to creating modern exhibitions;
- design solutions for new exhibitions in participating museums;
- resources of modern information technologies for the open museum information system;
- possible types and scenarios of the game for the museum visitors;
- principles for selecting the content for the museum information system.
Besides, an action plan was confirmed with experts and museums' representatives for the coming
months, in particular the experts’ sessions in the participating museums.
Quantitative results of the workshop:
- 68 participants;
- 1 round table "Euregio Karelia: positions, perspectives, introductions";
- 6 presentations by experts;
- 10 presentations by participating museums;
- 4 group work sessions with presentations of results;
- 1 visit to the National museum of the Republic of Karelia;
- 1 game session.
ACTIVITY 3. Elaborating or updating development concepts and exhibition scenarios for
museums.
Prior to the experts' sessions all museums received questions to work through connected with
preparation of materials for the development concepts for each museum (SWOT analysis) and a
table (matrix) to fill in that reflects the materials that the museum possesses and that are located
in the region that will be presented in the museum information system.
(the following information is originally presented in the table format)
- Immovable objects of heritage: Ethnography and folklore 5, Stone, architecture 5, War 5,
Transport routes 5, Place of birth/ deposits (metallurgy, etc.) 5;
- Exhibits: Ethnography and folklore 10, Stone, architecture 10, War 10, Transport routes 10,
Place of birth/ deposits (metallurgy, etc.) 10;
- Personalities: Ethnography and folklore 5, Stone, architecture 5, War 5, Transport routes 5,
Place of birth/ deposits (metallurgy, etc.) 5;
- Audio- and visual materials: Ethnography and folklore 5, Stone, architecture 5, War 5,
Transport routes 5, Place of birth/ deposits (metallurgy, etc.) 5;
- Articles published in the web: Ethnography and folklore 5, Stone, architecture 5, War 5,
Transport routes 5, Place of birth/ deposits (metallurgy, etc.) 5;
- Photographs, illustrations, documents: Ethnography and folklore 10, Stone, architecture 10,
War 10, Transport routes 10, Place of birth/ deposits (metallurgy, etc.) 10;
where Ethnography and folklore, Stone, architecture, War, Transport routes and Place of birth/
deposits (metallurgy, etc.) are theme/types of material.
- Immovable objects, photographs + description;
- Exhibits - dimensional (three-dimensional, not photographs, not documents, not illustrations).
These are the objects from the present exhibitions or from the museum collections which will be
used in the new exhibition;
- Personalities - photograph(s) + possible documents + description;
- Audiovisual materials - video, audio recordings (with a note whether they were digitalized or
not), what carrier, how they are used in the museum;
- Articles in the web written by museum staff or other people that cover the topic - author, name,
link, summary;
- Photographs, illustrations (pictures, etc.) and documents - flat exhibits or museum objects that
will be used in the new exhibition.
After having processed the information received from the museums, experts' sessions were
organized:
19. - 20.4.2013 - Regional museum of Northern Priladozhye, Sortavala;
13. - 14.5.2013 - Medvezhyegorsk regional museum, Medvezhyegorsk;
15. - 16.5.2013 - Cultural museum center, Kostomuksha;
17.5.2013 - National museum of the Republic of Karelia, Petrozavodsk;
22. - 26.6.2013 - North Karelia Museum (Joensuu), Fighter's House (Ilomantsi) (and a visit to the
Outokumpu Mining museum).
During the experts' sessions the project experts and managers met with the representatives of the
local administrations and museums and the local community members to hear their opinions
about the place of the museum in the cultural life of the region. During the sessions the SWOT
analysis was carried out and the directions for the development were discussed. Besides, the
experts reviews and updated the matrices that were filled in by the museums before the sessions.
Quantitative results:
- 6 experts' sessions;
- 1 visit to the Mining museum in Outokumpu;
- 68 participants;
- 9 matrices that structure the material for the museum information system.
Based on the results of the work done during the experts' sessions three development concepts
were elaborated/updated for the museums in Medvezhyegorsk, Kostomuksha and Sortavala. The
scenario concepts for new hypertext-based museum exhibitions were also created. The
development concepts and scenarios for exhibitions were negotiated with partner museums.
Besides the SWOT analysis the museum development concepts comprise the following sections:
- Mission, values and goals;
- Target groups for museum products;
- Place of the museum in the museums' regional network;
- A functional model of the museum;
- Field-specific area of expertise;
- Priority lines of the museum activity;
- Concept of educational activity of the museum;
- Priorities in research activities of the museum;
- List of resources integrated into the museum's activities;
- Marketing strategy of the museum.
***********************
SORTAVALA
Being responsible for identifying, collecting, preserving and increasing the values of natural and
cultural heritage of the North Ladoga region, the Museum sees its social mission as follows:
-
to provide free access to the values and relevant information to the visitors
(institutions, individuals, locals and guests, including foreign visitors);
to offer visitors as equal partners of the museum a set of communication and other
associated services that are connected with beneficial use of museum resources and
technologies to meet their cognitive, educational, creative, economic and other
needs.
SCENARIO CONCEPT OF THE EXHIBITION IN THE MUSEUM OF NORTH LADOGA
REGION
Name: Sortavala Stone Keys
Place: Entrance exhibition hall (50 sq.m) and its outside area (museum yard) (300 sq. m.)
The exhibition targets at:
- Presenting the North Ladoga Region (and Sortavala as its symbolic key) as a group of (stone)
blocks that form a common (stone) basement as one of the most important (stone) supports for
what (construction, bridge) binds the Russian, Karelian, Finnish and All-European cultures into
one.
- Creating a special type of the exhibition in the system of exhibitions, tours and travel routes of
the Regional Museum of North Ladoga Lake that combines the functions of (a) a monographic
narrative devoted to a particular topic and (b) a hypertext-based reference and information guide
designed to help the visitors find their way in the information environment of the museum.
- Creating a friendly high tech information environment within the museum exhibition in order
to help the visitors to create their own strategies, scenarios and tours to get familiarized and
interact with this particular museum and other museums in the region, with the city, with the
area, with the Republic of Karelia, with Russia and the world (including their geography, history
and culture).
Structure of the exhibition:
1. Natural history (local minerals and rocks of different composition, age and origin)
2. Archaeology (materials used by ancient people to make tools, weapons, cult objects)
3. Ethnic history (materials to make household utensils, dishware, decorations, amulets)
4. Industrial history (iron ore, copper ore, silver ore, other minerals for the industry)
5. War history (materials to make fortresses, cannon charges, flint weapons)
6. Political history (stone materials to mark state borders and to produce symbols of power)
7. History of communications (samples of materials used to make roads, bridges, piers,
computers)
8. History of architecture and design (building materials, finishing materials)
9. Art history (materials used to make famous monuments, bas-reliefs, gravestones)
***********************
MEDVEZHYEGORSK
The museum mission: being a collector, a keeper, a researcher and a popularizer of natural and
cultural heritage of the areas of Zaonezhye, Segozerye, Vygoretsiya and the adjacent areas the
museum is ready to assist people and organizations that are looking for:
- business connections and personal contacts;
- maps, landmarks and good travelers' recommendations;
- knowledge, experience, useful information;
- positive emotions, feelings and impressions;
- demonstrations of personal achievements and testing of personal capacities.
SCENARIO CONCEPT OF THE EXHIBITION IN THE MEDVEZHYEGORSK REGIONAL
MUSEUM
Name: Zaonezhsky Junction or the Roads We Take
The exhibition targets at:
-
-
Presenting the Medvezhyegorsk region as a system of communications: walking
paths, side roads, concrete and asphalt roads, railroads, water ways, airways,
crossroads, junctions, passages, crossings, bridges, ports, terminals, lines of ethnic
and labor migrations, cargo and passenger flows and travel routes.
Creating a friendly high tech information environment within the museum exhibition
in order to help the visitors to create their own strategies, scenarios and tours to get
familiarized and interact with this particular museum and other museums in the
region, with the city, with the area, with the Republic of Karelia, with Russia and the
world (including their geography, history and culture).
Short scenario structure:
1. Stone alleys (geological maps - geological routes);
2. Water ways (maps of hydrographic network; the White Sea - Baltic Sea Canal; water trips;
extreme, water and sport tourism);
3. Lines of life (maps of landscape, forests, natural habitats and migration routes of animals, eco
tourism);
4. Crossroads of history (archaeology and history maps; population settlement maps; maps of
monuments and museums; expeditions; travel routes);
5. Anthropological streams (ethnographic, demographic, historical and cultural maps;
ethnographic tourism);
6. State roads (political and administrative borders, layouts of railroads, federal and other
motorways, auto-, motor-, and bicycle tourism);
7. Stages of sorrow and grief (GULAG maps, mass burials, necropolises, monuments,
memorials, memorial events);
8. Inscrutable ways (battle maps, fortresses, fortifications, military and historical campaigns)
***********************
KOSTOMUKSHA
The mission for the Cultural and museum center in Kostomuksha is defined as follows:
- We know our city and its people as no one else;
- We know all local enterprises and organizations from their start as no one;
- We know the dates of the construction of every house, every building, every street and every
park;
- We remember each event that happened in our city from the beginning;
- We are in contact with the participants and eyewitnesses of these events;
- All our knowledge is supported by documents and physical evidence;
- We know and love our city because we are its cultural and museum center;
- If you are a local or a visitor we are at your service;
- We will share our knowledge. We will tell, show, guide, introduce, help and notify;
- This is our professional duty, public acknowledgement and cultural mission.
SCENARIO CONCEPT OF THE EXHIBITION OF THE CULTURAL AND MUSEUM
CENTER IN KOSTOMUKSHA
Name: Chronograph of the Kostomuksha Birthplace
The exhibition targets at:
- Assisting the development of local community of Kostomuksha, shaping its identity, common
consciousness and urban patriotism by constituting a becoming phenomenon of the city cultural
heritage which is a system of locally significant symbolic initiatives, achievements, objects,
personalities and the dates of their birth.
- Introducing a chronicle of Kostomuksha as a unique settlement that boast short but distinctive
history and cultural heritage that can be a source of development for culture, social sphere and
economy of the young city by using a unique photo archive and the latest mobile technologies.
- Creating a special exhibition unit within a system of exhibitions and tours of the Cultural and
museum center that combines functions of (a) a historical narrative illustrated with unique photo
documents, and (b) a reference retrieval system (chronological directory) that guides in the
information and cultural environment of the city.
- Creating a friendly high tech information environment within the museum exhibition in order
to help the visitors to create their own strategies, scenarios and tours to get familiarized and
interact with the city of Kostomuksha, its geography, history, culture, heritage sites and objects,
and different aspects of their interpretation and presentation.
Thematic structure of the exhibition:
Born in Kostomuksha:
1. The city (and its elements)
2. Objects (and achievements)
3. Enterprises (and corporations)
4. Organizations (and communities)
5. Monuments (and memorial sites)
6. Happenings (and specific events)
7. People (and "names")
*******************
The projects’ corporate identity was also developed to be used in all project documents such as
letterheads, letters, business cards and printed materials for all participating museums.
ACTIVITY 4. Holding a closed competition "Museum Hypertext of Karelia. Modules,
Junctions, Links"
In the beginning of the project a group of designers was formed out of the Russian experts in
museum exhibitions that comprise:
1. Expomania Ltd., Moscow
2. Ludi Architects Ltd., St.Petersburg
3. Creative group (artist Sergei Terenyev and Artnavolok Ltd.), Petrozavodsk
These three design organizations took part in the Opening Karelia workshop in March 2013 to
get an understanding about the project's goals.
Along with the development concepts and exhibitions' scenario concepts a technical specification
was developed for each museum (Sortavala, Kostomuksha and Medvezhyegorsk) to hold a
closed competition for the exhibition designs. Together with additional materials about the
museums and the matrices which were filled in by the museums the technical specification was
sent to the competition participants. On September 2-5, 2013 the designers undertook a trip to
Sortavala, Kostomuksha, Medvezhyegorsk and Petrozavodsk to see the museums' premises.
The closed competition comprised 2 stages:
1. Participants submit design drafts; the winner is chosen;
2. The winner makes design projects for the three museums; a technical specification for
renovation works is written.
In order to choose the winner, a special experts'’ council was formed. Based on the
submitted design drafts Artnavolok Ltd. from Petrozavodsk was announced a winner.
The evaluation of design drafts was based on a 3-point rating scale:
1 - low
2 - medium
3 - high
(the following information is originally presented in the table format)
LUDI ARCHITECTS: 9 points
Adaptation of the contents of both the project and museums 1
Concept 1
Creative design 2
Compliance with the technical specification 2
Feasibility 3
EXPOMANIA: 11 points
Adaptation of the contents of both the project and museums 1
Concept 1
Creative design 3
Compliance with the technical specification 3
Feasibility 3
ARTNAVOLOK: 12 points
Adaptation of the contents of both the project and museums 3
Concept 3
Creative design 2
Compliance with the technical specification 2
Feasibility 2
where Adaptation of the contents of both the project and museums, Concept, Creative design,
Compliance with the technical specification and Feasibility are the criteria.
A contract was signed with Artnavolok Ltd. and the creative group from Petrozavodsk
comprising artist Sergei Terentyev who has extensive experience in making exhibitions for the
Republic of Karelia and young designer Egor Permyakov (Artnavolok Ltd.) started their work on
developing the design projects for the three museum exhibitions.
Unfortunately, with time it turned out that the mutual understanding and communication within
the creative group has not been properly organized and the young designer doesn't have enough
experience in drafting engineering designs and descriptions. According to the plan the design
projects for all three museums were supposed to be ready by January 15, 2014 and renovations
and the production of exhibitions were to be followed right after. But in reality the first design
project for the Medvezhyegorsk museum was ready only in March 2014. They started working
on the second design project for the Kostomuksha museum only in April 2014 which will be
ready in the middle of May 2014. After the preliminary work and measurements inside and
outside the Sortavala museum done by the team from Petrozavodsk it was decided to sign a
contract for making an exhibition design for this museum with another design company,
Expomania Ltd. from St.Petersburg. It scored second in the closed competition. The decision
was made by the project managers when it was clear that the Petrozavodsk team will not meet
the deadlines. The design project for Sortavala should be ready by the end of April 2014 and the
exhibition will be created and set up in September 2014 so that the visit tour scheduled for the
fall 2014 happens in time.
ACTIVITY 5. Holding a Russian-Finnish symposium "Horizons of the Euregio Karelia
region. Museums 3.0."
On February 6-7, 2014 Joensuu hosted a Russian-Finnish symposium "Horizons of the Euregio
Karelia region. Museums 3.0". Over 60 participants representing different professional fields
came together to talk about modern museum strategies, museum information technologies,
museum marketing and communication. The symposium was moderated by Elena Zelentsova,
the first deputy head of the Moscow Department for Culture. Experts from Moscow were invited
to take part in the symposium. Among them were art critic Georgy Nikich, museum designer
Nickolai Nikishin, experts of the Museum Solutions creative group Natalia Kopelyanskaya and
Alexander Artamonov, expert of the Museum Development Center Darya Agapova.
Representatives of the cultural authorities of Russia and Finland, IT experts, experts in marketing
and designers were also invited.
During the symposium the participants were introduced to a new approach in creating modern
exhibitions called the museum hypertext as a perspective and flexible model to establish an
effective connection between the museum and the visitor. The concepts and the design projects
which were developed during the project for the new exhibitions in the museums of
Medvezhyegorsk, Kostomuksha and Sortavala were also introduced. The highlight of the
symposium program was the presentation of an Open Karelia museum information system based
on the hypertext principle which is being created for the museums of the Euregio Karelia region.
The system was tested for the first time in the exhibition of the North Karelia Museum, Joensuu.
During the symposium the Finnish and Russian experts made presentations on information
technologies in the museum field and how they can be used. A round table "Towards museum
3.0" was held. The participants also discussed the idea and the concept of the interactive game
"Opening Karelia" which is to be produced during the project. The partners from the North
Karelia Museum presented their Virtual Sortavala program module.
The second day gave start to the educational program for museum specialists. Among the topic
discussed during day 2 were the museum communication 3.0 and how to work with today's
visitors, marketing of museum products and services, and the key terms of the new marketing
strategy for the Euregio Karelia museums (new markets, target groups, services, souvenir
products, and promotion technologies). The symposium program as well as all the presentations
can be traced at the project's website.
On February 6, 2014 the Destination - Karelia photo and multimedia exhibition by Anastasia
Khoroshilova (Russia - Germany) and Jaakko Heikkila (Finland) was opened in the Carelicum
cultural and tourist center as part of the symposium program.
ACTIVITY
6.
Photo
and
multimedia
exhibition
"Destination
-
Karelia"
During the preparation for the exhibition several trips were undertaken by photographers
Anastasia Khoroshilova (Russia-Germany) and Jaakko Heikkila (Finland) to the Euregio Karelia
region. The first photo trip was taken by Anastasia Khoroshilova in June 2013. Two more trips
for Anastasia Khoroshilova and Jaakko Heikkila were organized in August 2013 to the cities and
villages of the region.
Both artists focused on Karelia with its historical, ethnographical, natural, geographical, social
and cultural diversity. They viewed Karelia as a unique place which, on one hand, is separated
by the state border of Russia and Finland and by the social, military and economic history. And
on the other hand this area has a lot of common features that form the phenomenon called the
Euregio Karelia region.
Anastasia Khoroshilova focused on making a series of portraits of the residents of Karelia who
guided her through the cities and villages they live in and the places that matter to them. Through
this exhibition both photographers made an attempt to show how the inner world and the identity
of the local people correlate with the national split by traditions, historical memory and the way
of life. The answers can be found in the endless photo sheet by Anastasia Khoroshilova and the
photo and audio installation by Jaakko Heikkila.
The exhibition was displayed in 4 cities:
- Moscow, ZIL cultural center, 21.09. - 27.10.2013;
- St.Petersburg, Peter and Paul Fortres (Exhibition Hall "Postern and Casemate of the Gosudarev
Bastion"), 05.11. - 24.11.2013;
- Joensuu, Carelicum cultural, museum and tourist center, 06.02. - 05.03.2014;
- Petrozavodsk, City exhibition hall, 14.03. - 04.04.2014.
In Moscow the exhibition was held along with the 5th Moscow Biennial of Contemporary Art
and was included into the program of the biennial. In all venues the exhibition was opened by
curator Georgy Nikich. In Moscow, St.Petersburg and Joensuu photographers Anastasia
Khoroshilova and Jaakko Heikkila joined the opening ceremonies. Press conferences for mass
media were held during all exhibition openings. The exhibition aroused great interest and
positive feedback from the visitors, the photo shooting characters, and the media representatives.
The representatives of the Karelian Communities were among the guests of the exhibition
openings in Moscow and St.Petersburg. The photo shooting characters were special guests at the
opening in Petrozavodsk and enjoyed a Skype conversation with Anastasia Khoroshilova from
Berlin.
Quantitative results:
- 3 photo trips to more than 10 cities and villages of the Euregio Karelia region;
- 4 exhibitions in 4 cities;
- Over 7 000 exhibition visitors;
- 1000 copies of the exhibition catalog (in Russian and English).
ACTIVITY 7. Developing an open museum information system of the Euregio Karelia
region and creating its content
During the past year the project team and the participating museums worked their way from the
idea to the clear vision of the information system and the perspectives of its development in the
post-project period.
The work that has been done can be divided into two parts: development of the system and
creation of the content.
1. DEVELOPMENT OF THE INFORMATION SYSTEM
The first step was to understand and comprehend the idea of museum hypertext and find ways to
implement the idea taking into account available technologies, funding and timeframes. The
team focused on elaborating the draft technical documentation in order to develop the vision and
define functional features of the system as well as on analyzing present and future information
systems in Russia used in the museum field.
The project team agreed that in order to fully correspond to the idea of the project, the Open
Karelia museum information system should take into account personal preferences of the users,
provide freedom in their behavior when choosing the objects of interest and tours, have a flexible
retrieval system and an open architecture for further work and decrease of costs in the postproject period.
The information systems that were analyzed could be divided into two big groups:
- Data bases such as Europeana, Google cultural project, Musketti system (Finland), KAMIS
system (Russia). Being different, they do have common features - big information content,
significant financial and organizational support, participation of important state and commercial
structures. On the other hand, as a rule they are closed systems in terms of information and
possibility of using it. They are targeted at specific tasks to record museum objects and have a
number of technical, financial and organizational requirements;
- Information reporting system (guides, audio guides, etc.).
Guides have relatively closed and limited information on particular museums with no possibility
for fast changes of content and a requirement of qualified technical support. Mobile applications
require constant modifications to comply with operational systems of mobile devices updated by
the producers.
SmartMuseum was considered the most interesting development which boasts features like
modular programming and rapid introduction. The project team met with the SmartMuseum
management to discuss possibilities of using this system in the project.
Negotiations were also held with other developers such as SurfCity guides, OPAS system
(France), etc.
To specify technical capacities of the system, contact was taken to Softline group that represents
the Google company in Russia. A teleconference was held with Google USA.
The following companies were selected as potential developers of the information system: the IT
Park of the Petrozavodsk university, I-Free company (developers of "Walking in Oranienbaum"
augmented reality program), Wikipedia community in Russia (developers of WikiSemantic
program product), Fruct association.
Some of the potential developers were invited to take part in the Opening Karelia workshop in
March 2013. The goal was to give a clear picture of the philosophy and target groups of the
information system and its functional features, to introduce project experts and to collect
feedback.
During the workshop the potential developers were targeted at finding options for the system
architecture that would most correspond to the idea of the hypertext. The following suggestions
were made:
1. Data base with information retrieval also in external resources;
2. Free search in available resources, a museum information retrieval engine;
3. Combination of both options with possible use of advantages of each system.
It was also considered important that the system provides data from available museum
information systems, both Russian and Finnish, and that the data formats are followed for
possible integration into the Europeana system for fuller representation of the Euregio Karelia
region in the European information space.
The following are the essential details of the system: consideration of behavior patterns of the
visitors and their locations, high level of personalization, modular programming, new
participants in the future, and integration with social networks. The system should provide access
to the maximum number of devices such as touch screens and information kiosks, personal
computers, mobile devices. Wi-Fi is a must. QR codes and other tags such as NFS and
geotracking are appropriate.
After the workshop a series of experts' sessions were organized in participating museums to
gather information and to evaluate museums from the technical side.
The team summarized information, built their vision about the system and collected proposals
from potential system developers: the IT Park of the Petrozavodsk University, I-Free company,
SoftLine group, SurgCity guide, Fruct association, WikiSemantic development. The decision
was made in favor of the Open Innovations Association FRUCT.
The choice was made based on the following criteria:
- Price;
- Open software used to decrease further costs to maintain the system in the postproject period;
- Use of Geo2tag platform as a data storage which is one of the leaders in geolocation
systems in the market of open free systems. Information created and published by the
project participants can be used as the basis to produce other applications such as
audio guides, virtual tours, etc. through any other project;
- Convenient information input; it is suggested that information is entered both
manually and automatically from different sources and data bases to provide prompt
update of information in case of changes. This is one of the modern ways of the
Internet development in general.
- Prompt joining of other parties for the mutual benefit - expansion of information,
introduction of different objects and links.
- Wide variety of means of visual representation of stored information which is easily
supplemented by different modules.
Presentation of the Open Karelia museum information system in a testing mode was made during
the Russian-Finnish symposium "Horizons of the Euregio Karelia region. Museums 3.0" in
February 2014. The symposium participants had an opportunity to evaluate the hypertext
principle of the exhibition of the North Karelia Museum both inside and outside the museum
getting information about objects and sights in the center of Joensuu. The system was
demonstrated using both tablets bought through the project and personal mobile phones and got
high evaluation of users and IT experts.
Cooperation with the Finnish partners and the Finland's National Board of Antiquities should be
specially mentioned. It is likely that this is the first common information environment being
created for our region which makes the information open and lets people use it for cooperation
and cultural tourism purposes.
Special thanks go to the North Karelia Museum, Joensuu for their active involvement and
committed and responsible approach to the implementation of the project.
A special module as part of the Open Karelia museum information system was developed for
disabled people (http://hypertext-mobile.geo2tag.org/audioguide). It's very important for them to
have an opportunity beforehand to plan a route both inside and outside the museum. Such plans
should take into consideration individual restrictions. Fro instance, a route for physically
challenged people should show ramps. For visually impaired people navigation should contain
voice messages. When exhibition is adjusted to the visually impaired people, sound information
about exhibits is primary. Through the project the exhibition of the National Museum of the
Republic of Karelia will be supplemented by such module.
The National Museum of the Republic of Karelia as a project partner applied the Open Karelia
museum information system and an audio guide module for people with special needs to the
Museum Geek Internet festival of museum multimedia. The Festival is created to support
innovative computer and multimedia programs for museums. Its aim is to foreground the topic of
new professional competencies of the museum community. The winner of the Festival will be
selected based on public voting at the Festival's web page. The voting is open until May 18,
2014. More about the Festival at http://gmir.ru/eng/special/festival/participate/information/.
2. CONTENT OF THE INFORMATION SYSTEM
Work in this direction started in March 2013 during the Opening Karelia workshop. The
participating museums made presentations of their museums introducing the most important
points for the project, namely the content of their exhibitions and collections, and local sights.
This information was essential for developing profile of the Euregio Karelia region in its
diversity of cultural, natural, economic and other features and finding common traits. During the
preparation for the workshop the research team suggested five initial topics as possible links ethnography and folklore, stone and architecture, war, transport routes, and place of birth. The
workshop participants elaborated on the topics during work group sessions and offered a system
of categories and layers of information display. They created the development models and
interconnections of different layers to be used in the system. They presented the region as
information flows that penetrate and connect it in different directions and ways and ended in the
vast cloud of conceptions and meanings.
During the experts' sessions with assistance from museums' staff objects, personalities and
exhibits were selected out of a great variety of available information which can form
intersections and links with other museums. The project group developed a matrix to collect
structured information as possible content for the information system.
Apart from working with participating museums the project team negotiated with potential
partners that have information resources and data bases on historical and cultural heritage.
Agreements have been reached with the Mining Road project about the content exchange.
Mutual understanding has been reached with the Petrozavodsk State University. A cooperation
agreement was signed with the National Archive of the Republic of Karelia. Information partners
were found in Sortavala – the Serdobol magazine and the Kronid Gogolev's Gallery. Consent
was received for using materials from the most popular websites in Karelia (Republican center
for monuments preservation, website of Andrei Heninen, Visit Karelia, Center of cultural
initiatives, etc.).
A research group responsible for content is constantly selecting reliable and interesting
information, edits, translates and puts it into the Open Karelia information system.
As soon as it was possible to enter information into the system the museums' staff started putting
texts and photographs into the system.
Apart from the manual input of information, automatic update of data is also possible.
Interaction with the Musketti museum system is successfully proceeding from the technical side.
The content team has also suggested Wikipedia as one of the possible sources of information. A
set of criteria and parameters is currently being defined for the selection of information from
Wikipedia to the Open Karelia system.
Selection of objects and exhibits from museum exhibitions has taken much of the time as well.
They should become special intersection, hyper junctions and entry points both to the Open
Karelia information system and to the common museum environment of the Euregio Karelia
region which is being created through the project.
Work on making additional audio and multimedia materials for the system has also begun.
Scenarios for 12 videos for the Medvezhyegorsk museum were written to be part of the new
exhibition and also to be downloaded to the Open Karelia information system. Similar work will
be carried out for the other museums participating in the project.
Development and content creation of the Virtual Sortavala module for the North Karelia museum
are under way.
ACTIVITY 8. Renovation and technical equipment of participating museums, including
engineering design
The fortified region area in Medvezhyegorsk was partly cleaned and improved. These works will
be continued in summer 2014. Information signs will also be placed there.
According to the requirements specification renovations were made in the Medvezhyegorsk
museum in its entrance area, a smaller exhibition room and the corridor where the new
exhibition section is being created under the name "The Zaonezhsky Junction". In late April
2014 work on making the exhibition and purchasing exhibition equipment will begin.
Renovations, creation of new exhibitions and purchase of equipment for the museums in
Kostomuksha and Sortavala will start in summer 2014. The list of equipment is specified, except
for the museums of Kostomuksha and Sortavala.