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The Seduction

Naturalis, Leiden

Request

The Seduction of Naturalis is a reproduction in nature-themed exhibition space that has never been seen before; full of humour, overt, and featuring the best bits of a science centre and natural history museum in one. This exhibition is primarily aimed at families and partly at teenagers, meaning non-stop fun.

Solution

The playful exhibition offers endless possibilities to interact. With something for everyone, it’s bursting with sensory stimulation and fun. Take the game that gets visitors to imitate mating dances, the digital pinball machine, or the spermarace — there is humour at eve-ry turn. The digital elements follow the interior’s lush Jugendstil forms in a contemporary colour palette. Physical movement involving as space hoppers, buttons, and tracking are incorporated as digital game controls.

What were the deliverables?

  • 1 interactive tracking dance game
  • 1 space hopper racing game
  • 1 digital pinball machine
  • 2 touchscreen games
  • 1 digital library application


The experience

The entire exhibition has been imagined in a modern, Jugendstil interpretation. The curls and adornments as popularised by the Paris metro lure visitors inside, much in the same way animals and plants use colour and markings to seduce.

Once inside, there is loads to discover and play. A digital pinball machine invites visitors of all ages to help a female duck change the course or dump sperm belonging to less than ideal mates. Using a touchscreen, they can also build nests for various animals.

Visitors practice their mating dance as instructed by different animals behind thick, velvet curtains, and play a dating game as a snail or dandelion. Two large spermacel space hoppers go head to head in a race towards the uterus, digitally reenacted on two screens.

After all that interaction energy supplies will be low, so visitors can take a break by scroll-ing through beautiful, old biology books from the archives using the digital library appli-cation. Upon leaving the museum, visitors will not be surprised that Naturalis was named Museum of the Year 2021.


Would you like to know more about The Seduction of Naturalis or have a similar project in mind? Please get in touch with Wouter Verbiest (wouter.verbiest@yipp.nl).





Credits:
Photography by Amy Kouwenhoven
Video by YIPP