Until 30 September 2015 in the Milan offices of Banca Generali goes on stage Digital Wall, the exhibition by the artist from Reggio Emilia Fabrizio Plessi inaugurated on 21 May: real digital walls, the screens (100x60x4 cm each) are mounted like large mosaics and refer to films belonging to the most typical expressive style of Plexus, linked to the themes of water, fire, lava. The exhibition marks a point of discontinuity with the monumentality that has characterized Plessi's work up to now: the screens are stripped of any support, freed from any structure and, in fact, removed from any theatricality. Among the novelties of an exhibition that combines art with technology, however, an app could not be missing: BG Events, an application for smartphones and tablets developed exclusively by Banca Generali which allows the user to be guided in the use of the works directly by the artist through exclusive video contents which describe their emotions, genesis and creative dynamics. Downloadable for free from the Play Store for Android and from the Apple Store for iOS, the "BG Events" app is based on the principle of augmented reality (Augmented Reality, AR), i.e. a process that allows images of the physical world to be taken and superimposed on the digital one.
The trend of apps in museums is on the rise because technology is proving increasingly useful to the world of culture, both in terms of communication and for teaching and engagement activities. At the MoMA, for example, the app allows you to access explanations by the artists and experts of the exhibited works, to create a personalized collection, to become the protagonist of the museum by taking photos and sharing them on social networks and to consult the agenda of appointments .
Even the Guggenheim, the Louvre and the National Gallery already have an app. And the phenomenon is also spreading in Italy. The Apps have already landed for some time, for example to the Uffizi, MACRO e MaXXI di Roma. Same Bank of Italy, thanks to its IT department, built the system AMUSED to increase the usability of exhibitions, displays and museums by adults and children. The system was tested experimentally in the exhibition Let's invent a Banknote at Villa Huffer offering visitors the possibility of having at their disposal the reports that the participating schools have delivered together with the sketches of the celebratory banknotes for the Expo. In fact, the reports represent a mass of writings that are difficult to make easily consultable with traditional means. The AMUSE system, with the help of a tablet, allows access to the data in a contextual way when one is close to the sketches, without the visitor having to search for the general catalogue.
Even new Muse of Trento An App could not be missing: it allows you to use, with a simple iPad, in real time, while walking through the various rooms of the museum, new multimedia contents, video insights and 3D image galleries. It's about the "augmented reality" which is able to transform every object on display into something "alive". Thus the skeleton of a triceratops resumes its original form of a dinosaur immersed in its habitat on the iPad screen thanks to a three-dimensional reconstruction.
In Milan an app accompanied the temporary exhibition of Chagall and the Bible at the Diocesan Museum and a few months ago she was born Science Museum App, the free application that guides, explains, informs and reveals all the secrets of Museum of Science and Technology of Milan. An app is not only useful for the museum. But she is able to transform her surroundings into a museum. Thanks to an application developed by the company PROEDi province Duomo, La Scala Theater, the ships, But also the Cenacolo, Rondanini Pieta, San Siro, Three-year, all become subjects of a single exhibition: the Museum Milan. A sort of virtual archive to collect the city's excellence and tell its story in a modern, understandable and interesting way for young people too. There is a section dedicated to the history of the city, one to famous people, another to masterpieces. And obviously to the museums, divided into categories and with directions to reach them, the city map and information on public transport.
