Interactivity and audience experience in the modern museum: discussing findings from case study on the ‘High Arctic’ immersive installation, National Maritime Museum, London

Museums are shifting from being object and collection centered, towards a focus on space, affect and audience by producing multi-dimensional spatial non-lineal experiences. Interactivity is used unquestionably to verify this shift. Through the findings of a case study the ‘High Arctic’, a temporary exhibition at the National Maritime Museum, the paper will discuss how the museum interprets and practices the notion of interactivity. Through examining the multiplicity of museum with the focus being on process, the possibility of opening and creating new models of experience can be evaluated. Following Deleuze and Guattari, I suggest that this shift implies ‘continuous becoming’ rather than ‘being’, which can occur by means of affect (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987).