When The Yale Center for British Art wanted to celebrate a new permanent collection of Victorian Board Games with a full day of games, they brought in Forever Stoked to create an activation that allowed the visitors to connect with the collection in new and exciting ways.
The Yale Center for British Art wanted to celebrate a new permanent collection of Victorian Board Games with a full family day built around games which highlighted the center’s collection of British Art.
The games needed to be accessible to children, require limited resources, and encourage players to safely engage with the collection.
Forever Stoked delivered a series of original games for the YCBA but “The Grand Curator Challenge” was an especial favorite of the guest, museum staff, and ourselves. Focusing on their vast and varied collection we decided to give players the chance to be their own museum curator. They would get assigned a secret theme and then have to select the particular works of art they would choose for that show. After each player has selected the works for their show they would show those works to the other players who would then try to figure out the secret theme. Rather than have “the game” select particular works of art, we wanted to empower the players to be able to choose for themselves from the YBCA’s incredible collection.
By engaging players to look deeper into the works, identifying themes, styles, and , we were able to create an experience that not only engaged players looking for fun, but also got them to experience the works in much greater depth.
We’ve all been invited by the YCBA to set up our own gallery shows based around a specific theme. Try to build the best show out of the available artwork, and figure out what everyone else is thinking. Only the sharpest eyes and quickest mind will win the coveted crown of Head Curator!
“The Curator Game” was not only popular with museum visitors of all ages but was also a hit with the museum staff and especially the curators themselves. Having players look for art that fits their secret theme created a strong sense of engagement with the art and the museum itself. It also generated a personal connection with the works they chose. The process of looking and the works chosen for a collection and attempting to determine the secret theme not only had players looking and thinking deeply at art but it also generated interesting conversations about the art’s themes and elements beyond the curators’ secret theme.
The game was so successful that YCBA has invited us back to run the game multiple times and plan to continue using it as part of their continuing educational activities.
