In the age of coronavirus (COVID-19), museums are facing unprecedented difficulties and uncertainty. In the past weeks, three-quarters of museums have shut down, starting with behemoths like the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museum of Fine Arts Boston, and the Smithsonian’s museums. While these indefinite closures are presenting challenges, museum professionals have acted rapidly and creatively to keep their audiences engaged remotely.

At Cuseum, we’re deeply interested in how new technology and approaches impact the multitude of ways museums and cultural attractions interact and engage with their visitors. Over the past few years, we’ve watched many changes redefine how organizations think about digital engagement and the general expectations and behaviors of their visitors.

There is a growing discussion around how AR can be used to elevate the museum experience and bring exhibitions to life. PSFK, a leading trend reporting publication and authority on consumer experience, reports on the topic in the piece “How Augmented Reality is Changing the Museum Experience.” 

Dan Sullivan, head of Growth & Partnerships at Cuseum, recently spoke at MIT Museum’s “Hacking the Museum,” which was part of the larger Cambridge Science Festival that took place from April 13-22. The event brought together leading minds from across industries to “talk about and demo museum APIs and collections databases with museum hackers” and to look at how technology like AR can be leveraged in the museum space.

Cuseum was recently featured in Wired, a leading technology news publication, in an article that explores the growing role of augmented reality in museums, and how it can be used to engage visitors and drive creativity. Additionally, the use of AR in museums illustrates how technology has the potential to “shake up” the museum world, and bring institutions into the digital age in a way that will speak to a larger audience.