This is an exhibit about endangered species, designed to make people thing about what causes endangerment and extinction. Is it good or bad? What are the effects on our environment and ecosystem? How are we impacting endangered animals, for better or worse? In addition, it should acquaint people with the animal world and how we coexist with it, and how we influence each other.
I planned on carrying out this objective by first getting everyone interested and involved with the different animals and ecosystems out there. This is accomplished by the three nature immersive rooms that really familiarize you with the respective environments. Then at the end, when you enter the center, circular room, the viewing windows and art pieces compel you to reflect on everything you just experienced, and how human actions affect the world around us.
I chose art pieces of a variety of different endangered species, from a variety of geographic locations, to try and show how diverse the world inhabitants are, and how far-reaching the effects of extinction could be. There are also from a wide range of time periods, to show that throughout human history our cultures have been affected by these animals that are now in danger of being lost forever. Whether the art be of a religious nature or just purely artistic, it shows that these animals have had an impact on society.
I chose to have a soundscape for the nature scenes in order to, again, make it as immersive as possible, and to really try to get people to feel what it’s like in those environments. There was no soundscape in the last room in order to foster thought rather than experience, or in other words, so people can think about the issues at hand without getting distracted.
I also decided to keep the written information limited while in the immersive environments, in order to encourage people to focus on really bonding with nature, and to learn about the animals and how they interact. While at the end, in the last room, the written information is more abundant in order to leave people really thinking about the topic. There would be information on how extinction of species might affect us, and what we’re doing about it. There would be information on if there are any positives to extinction, in order to challenge the popular notion that there are only negative effects. And more stuff like that.
