Urban Frames

As part of the exhibition “Herman Bollé: Builder of the Croatian Metropolis” at the Museum of Arts and Crafts in Zagreb, our task was to design a stand for a city map marking the buildings where Bollé intervened, which would serve as a marker for key Bollé buildings in the city.

We understood the task as an extension of the “indoor” exhibition to the “outdoor” – in real time and space, thus presenting the exhibition to random passersby, with the the subject of the exhibition being the city itself.

For the exact locations of the informational elements, we did not choose the positions of the buildings but rather the frequent paths of citizens and visitors, where we “catch the eyes” of passersby (during the time of view counting) and direct them towards the specific building. With this premise, we designed the informational spatial element as a frame that points to an individual building from the suggested observer position. The element placed “in the way” encourages passersby to study the object and look through the element itself, and to study the map of Bollé’s buildings located below the frame. The element is basic in design, clearly emphasizing the essence – suggesting the observer’s position and directing the view.

This completely low tech, recognizable “window” redirects the passerby’s gaze from their mobile phone to the city, to the buildings they pass by every day without noticing. The same mobile phone is now used to photograph the “offered picture”. The interaction continues by detecting the particular building on the map and “weaving” it into the image of the city. Ultimately, this segment of the exhibition becomes an interactive game.