Investigating the Artist’s Role in Social Group Games

Abstract

Social interactions are a key objective in cultural experience design and museum games are often aimed to foster conversations between visitors. However, the participation of cultural creators is hardly explored. In this paper we examine how the artists may participate in storytelling games played over their artworks. We present a field study at a museum exhibition, where the artist joined a group of visitors crafting and sharing stories over his paintings. We investigate how the artist’s participation affected the group experience, considering the visitors’ perspective along with the artist’s. Both sides reported positive outcomes, indicating an engaging social cultural experience. Furthermore, we discuss the effects of bystanders in traditional as opposed to game-event settings. Building upon the later, we pinpoint limitations and challenges over the artist’s participation, and explore varying levels of engagement, sketching good practices and new directions.