Capturing the arts for digital

For the last five decades, LEWIS has partnered with clients across a whole variety of sectors. In this series, our creative team recount their experiences in the Museum and Arts sector and the creative storytelling that this kind of work allows (the stuff we can’t get enough of!).

Why? Because each exhibition has its own tale to tell and we love getting to grips with the intricacies of the collections that we are lucky enough to explore on a daily basis.

This summer, our team participated in an incredibly insightful MuseumNext event in which each speaker shared their creative experiences. These are some of the themes that resonated with us the most, along with our thoughts on each.

Community is key - even in digital

We know the physical space is always important but, during the pandemic, we came to appreciate that there is so much more that the sector can do to engage the community digitally and to expand their reach on a global level.

So how is this achieved and what’s the point?

Probably the best starting point is what is the point? For anything to be meaningful there must be some sort of purpose and drive behind it. The point of your physical space is to engage, educate and inspire and this is the exact same purpose for digital - but with scope to reach an ever bigger and more diverse audience.

And then the how. It goes without saying that the starting point is your website. However, as beautiful as your site may be, it’s unlikely anyone other than your staff will visit it every day. So, we need to create other touch points. Where is your target market every day? What do they do when they are commuting, waiting to pick up their kids or sitting on the sofa at the end of a busy day? In many cases, social media fills these gaps in the day. We can utilise these platforms to target people who are relevant and already engaged on these platforms. Social media gets a bad rep for being wasteful, but it can also be used for education and for helping people to feel more fulfilled.

This is where arts and museums can step in and make content that is interesting, inspires and makes people want to find out more. Once you get that precious follow, which, believe us, is getting increasingly difficult on saturated platforms like Instagram, you can then tell them more and more of your stories.

What kinds of digital content works?

The ever-inspiring Frederic Bertley - also known as ‘Dr B’ is the President and CEO of the COSI - Center of Science and Industry in Columbus, Ohio. He creates video content that explains complex themes using simple, engaging animations. Everything is well considered including the choice of music that has a beat not too dissimilar to 90s Dr Dre (although not close enough to warrant a law suit 🤣). The Viral Variants animation was one of Dr B’s key successes, making the COVID 19 pandemic simple to understand.

But naturally, not everyone is going to have the same presence as Dr B. During the Q&A, our team asked what his recommendations were for the more camera-shy museum directors…his response: “You’ve got to be your authentic self. You can’t put a square peg in a round hole! Find the right people and, if they still seem a bit awkward, you can always write a script and get a VO. Essentially, there’s always ways around these things and if your museum director isn’t keen to be in front of the camera, you can still make truly engaging video content.”

Top 4 takeaways?

Museums MUST be more than its bricks and mortar.

1.  Stick to your North Star (what are you good at?)
2. Search for creative outlets/opportunities
3. Look for creatives within your team - the videos Dr B shared were all made in-house with the help of his team and a hired animator
4. Have an authentic connection to the community.

So, what hidden talents do your team have? We as an agency love to work with internal teams to get them excited about creative opportunities. Think of us like an extension to your team. We don’t want to do a quick design solution and leave you to it. We want to become immersed in your brand and creative needs and inspire you to find creative ways of expressing your content, with or without our help.

If you’d like some support or just fancy a chat, get in touch with emily@lewis.co.uk. Stay tuned for the next blog post on Museum Next. We’ll be looking at how you could make your own treasure hunt using your collection items as well as how you can create branded art packages to get people engaged digitally.