Surprise machines: revealing Harvard Art Museums' image collection

TL;DR

Surprise Machines is an experimental project that visualizes Harvard Art Museums' extensive collection using AI-driven interfaces to evoke surprise and engagement among visitors.

Contribution

It introduces a novel choreographic interface that links visitor movement with unique visualizations of a large art collection, exploring AI's potential in museology.

Findings

Successfully visualized over 200,000 objects

Created an interactive experience that evokes surprise

Demonstrated AI's role in enhancing museum engagement

Abstract

Surprise Machines is a project of experimental museology that sets out to visualize the entire image collection of the Harvard Art Museums, intending to open up unexpected vistas on more than 200,000 objects usually inaccessible to visitors. Part of the exhibition Curatorial A(i)gents organized by metaLAB (at) Harvard, the project explores the limits of artificial intelligence to display a large set of images and create surprise among visitors. To achieve such a feeling of surprise, a choreographic interface was designed to connect the audience's movement with several unique views of the collection.