The exhibition “Soziologie in Frankfurt: 1910–2010” offers the public insight into the history of sociology in Frankfurt and was part of the 35th anniversary of the Congress of Sociology in 2010, which has been hosted by Universität Frankfurt since 1910. We developed the interactive sections of the exhibit including a very fast and playful way to explore a huge archive of scanned documents, letters, and photographs. This allowed visitors to get a behind-the-scenes look at the forces at play in the history of sociology in Frankfurt. With over 1,200 documents (most of them shown for the first time to the public) visitors could follow the path of sociology’s history in Frankfurt from its beginnings around 1910 to contemporary developments.
The key elements of the design of the exhibits are legibility, accessibility, and skimming speed. We installed a high-resolution monitor and a shuttle-wheel which enabled very fast and simple scrolling through all documents. No other navigation is necessary. Imagine a 1,200 page PDF or a multi-volume printed tome in an exhibition; we succeeded in making the exhibit much more faster and accessible to skim through than a real book (let alone a PDF).
The digital display system allows many features for searching and accessing information.
Given the tight budget, only very little additional data visualization was implemented; a vertical timeline on the left side shows a timeline from 1910 to 2010 with a curved line connecting the documents to their date of creation.
The digital display system allows many features for searching and accessing information.
Given the tight budget, only very little additional data visualization was implemented; a vertical timeline on the left side shows a timeline from 1910 to 2010 with a curved line connecting the documents to their date of creation.
The handling of the exhibit is self-explanatory and invites to discover
© MESO Digital Interiors / Patrick Raddatz
Curious about our approach? Feel free to get in touch!
Sebastian Oschatz Partner +49 69 24 000 321 sebastian.oschatz@meso.design sebastian.oschatz@meso.design +49 69 24 000 321
MESO Digital Interiors GmbH
Gutleutstr. 96 . 60329 Frankfurt . Germany
Team
Max Wolf, Nils Weger, Patrick Raddatz, Jochen Leinberger, Philipp Lorenz