The goal of every museum exhibit, large and small, is to educate an audience while providing an enjoyable excursion. However, effective exhibits need not be high budget affairs. Many small museums do very well with limited funding. Use the following steps and you will be able to put together a quality exhibit at little cost.
Instructions
1. Identify your audience. Just as in the corporate advertising world, museums have target audiences. This includes specific age ranges, professions, backgrounds and family units.
2. Pick out a theme for the exhibit. This should be an overarching idea that your exhibit will explore. Work it into an exhibit title.
3. Create a list of individual messages for the exhibit. These are sub-themes, specific points that you want to convey to your target audience.
4. Choose the artifacts to put in the exhibit. The artifacts should always support the major theme and the individual messages.
5. Write out the text blurbs for your exhibit. Center each one around an educational point from your list of messages. Write each blurb so that it fits with your target audience. Use a large font with lots of space between each line and have line breaks between each paragraph.
6. Create a drawing of your exhibit space. Use it to plan the layout of your exhibit. Be sure that each blurb you place in it flows organically into the next point. Studies show that when entering an exhibit space people usually turn right, so make that area the beginning of your exhibit.
7. Print your blurbs onto sticky-backed printer paper, which can be found at office supply stores. Peel the stickers off of the backing and put them on poster board cut to fit the blurbs. Attach the blurbs to your displays using museum wax.
8. Wearing cotton gloves, place the artifacts in the displays. Stick them down with museum wax. If you have two-dimensional pieces for the displays, prop them up with photo holders or hang them on the wall. Be sure that the surface on which you stick the artifacts is safe for them. Do not leave metal in contact with wood or vice versa.
