BMW Museum (2008)
The BMW Museum in Munich embodies a new approach to combining architecture and exhibition design, placing special emphasis on new media. It re-opened on 21 June 2008, following a construction period of two and a half years. Originally, the museum was housed in the “Bowl”, a building completed in 1973 and designed by architect Karl Schwanzer. The new museum building increases the exhibition space by five times to 5,000 m².
BMW commissioned ART+COM with the museum’s spatial media design and interactive installations and Stuttgart’s Atelier Brückner with the architecture and exhibition design. The joint concept was determined by two underlying themes: mobility and dynamism.
ART+COM’s media concept is based on interactive, reactive and cinematic elements. Spatial choreographies of projections, light and sound create a dynamic backdrop for the seven “exhibition houses” and 25 rooms, appearing to animate the architecture and 125 exhibits. Interactive installations and so-called “auxiliary” formats help convey the museum’s content by providing in-depth information.
One of the highlights of the museum is the Mediatecture, a 700 m² media façade surrounding the central BMW Square. Another is the Kinetic Sculpture. This mechatronic installation is a spatial representation of the form-finding process in art and design.
The holistic museum experience is supported by a unique sound concept based on an acousmonium, composed by Swiss audio designers idee und klang.
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Client
BMW Group
Services
- Overall concept for the BMW Museum (with Atelier Brückner and the BMW project team)
- Conception and development of the spatial media design and the interactive installations
- Media design
- Application programming
- Interface design and construction
- Audio planning
- Media technology planning
- Supervision of realisation of media technology
- Site management of media technology subsections
- Project management
Technology
- Over 700 m² of video-capable, monochrome LEDfaçades with 60 Hz supply
- 360° installation with a diameter of 40 metres
- Kinetic Sculpture consisting of 714 metal spheres, individually controllable with millimetre accuracy
- interactive installations with sensor surfaces (a total of approx. 30 m²)
- 50 beamers
- 30 image recognition systems
- 75 computers for relaying images/sounds
- 270 audio channels with DSP and 540 speakers
- Acousmatic audio technology
- Reactive audio channels
- KVM matrix
- CMS for media content
- Integrated control of all media
- 20 control computers
Special features
- The BMW Museum is a joint project of ART+COM (spatial media design, interactive installations) and Atelier Brückner (architecture, exhibition design).
- Audio design: idee und klang
- Graphic design and visual identity: Intégral Ruedi Baur
- LED-technology: G-LEC Europe GmbH
- Media technology: ict Technologies AG
- Technology of the Kinetic Sculpture: MKT AG