Since 1969, San Francisco’s Exploratorium has been at the fore of interactive and informal science learning. Over the past 20 years, Dr Anne Richardson has contributed to the centre’s innovative approach, fusing science and art to spark curiosity and wonder in its visitors.
Around San Francisco’s historic Piers 15 and 17, the bayside streets are bustling. The air is briny and city sounds mingle with the shrieks of gulls. But inside the sprawling Exploratorium, it feels a world apart from the hubbub outside.
Visitors stand in quiet contemplation before a curved arrangement of 34 mirror panes, adjusted meticulously to reflect only the viewer. Questions start percolating in their mind – about themselves, and the very nature of light and optics.
The exhibit, by award-winning artist Daniel Rozin, is one of hundreds that fill the iconic San Francisco museum (or self-described “public learning laboratory”). And while interactive exhibits like this are increasingly common, the roots of this immersive educational experience trace back to the visionaries who founded and developed the Exploratorium – a cornerstone of informal, interactive education that incorporates elements of art and science.
The beginnings of the Exploratorium
The Exploratorium was founded in 1969 by particle physicist Frank Oppenheimer (brother of J. Robert Oppenheimer, of atomic bomb fame). Oppenheimer was ostracised from research during McCarthyism in the 1950s – a period marked by intense anti-communist sentiment in the United States. Caught in the political crossfire, Oppenheimer’s research career was derailed, and he became a cattle rancher and a high-school science teacher in the small town of Pagosa Springs in Colorado.
It was in those classrooms that Oppenheimer began to build on a new, progressive approach that was taking place in the education sector – doing away with textbooks and rote learning, and filling his classroom with hands-on resources and equipment.
This sowed the seeds for what Oppenheimer called his “San Francisco Project”, originally located in the city’s Palace of Fine Arts. Oppenheimer worked with artists, scientists and educators to establish the Exploratorium as an early space for ‘informal science education’ – a term that describes a type of learner-driven, curriculum-free education that occurs outside the classroom. Oppenheimer served as director until just before his death in 1985.
Path of curiosity – Anne Richardson’s journey
Dr Anne Richardson – chief experience officer of the Exploratorium – has been a crucial part of the centre’s success. Growing up in Michigan, Richardson loved going to her local Ann Arbor Hands-On Museum, which she would later discover had been founded in 1978 in collaboration with a team from the Exploratorium. When she eventually moved across the country to San Francisco and visited the Exploratorium herself, she recalls how familiar it felt. “I was really excited to discover this connection,” she says.
Richardson soon fell in love with the work being done at the Exploratorium and was keen to be a part of it. She was particularly interested in its inquiry-based approach, “which is centred on the learner asking their own questions and investigating the world around them”, she says.
With an undergraduate degree in art history and a Master’s in environmental studies under her belt – as well as prior experience working in informal education – Richardson was a natural fit fort the Exploratorium. She started her first role in 2003, and spent a decade directing a programme to train and develop the centre’s guides, or ‘explainers’. This work also inspired the topic of her PhD dissertation, which looked at how non-expert guides develop identities as science learners through participating in a community of practice.
After 20 years at the Exploratorium, Richardson has started her new role as chief experience officer, which focuses on the research and development of exhibit and program experiences in San Francisco and for the Exploratorium’s partners worldwide. She says Rozin’s Self Centered Mirror (2003) is one of her favourite exhibits, because it reflects the Exploratorium’s approach to art and science as two processes of inquiry.
The Exploratorium’s unique approach
Unlike other museums that might curate their exhibits with a specific message or learning outcome in mind, Richardson explains that the Exploratorium’s approach is to focus on asking questions and tapping into the perception and experience of the visitors.
“Some of our classic collections are ‘Seeing’ and ‘Listening’. You’ll notice they’re not called ‘Light’ and ‘Sound’, because human perception is a really important angle at the Exploratorium,” she says. “It’s not just what’s out there in the Universe and how that interacts with your biology, but also you as a human being. Because light really is only meaningful to us as we perceive it with our eyes and brains.”
The museum also conducts its own research into the nature of learning, which informs the design of the exhibits, most of which are developed in-house.
For example, in a three-year study called EDGE (Exhibit Designs for Girls’ Engagement), Exploratorium researchers examined STEM exhibits at the Exploratorium and other US science centres to identify what would improve engagement for girls aged 8 to 13. They identified nine design attributes, such as incorporating familiar, everyday objects, and optimising layouts to give visitors space to watch others interacting with an exhibition so they can see how it works. These kinds of attributes not only strongly and positively correlated with girls’ STEM engagement, but did so without negatively impacting boys’ engagement, and in some cases positively impacted boys’ engagement as well. Richardson says those findings may well have applications outside of the museum context. “We haven’t studied that, but I think that’s an exciting possibility,” she says.
The Exploratorium’s research has also informed the museum’s open-ended approach to learning. “Visitors don’t ever have the burden of thinking there’s a specific concept that they must understand when they leave. That’s really important,” Richardson says.
“The way we treat people is, ‘You are smart and capable of understanding anything that’s here.’”
Beyond the bay – expanding the Exploratorium’s impact
The Exploratorium’s reach extends outside the walls of its bayside location – and beyond the 500,000-plus visitors who pass through its doors each year.
They have assisted in the design, construction and launch of two new science centres – the SESI Lab, which opened in Brazil in November 2022, and the Kiewit Luminarium, which opened in Omaha, Nebraska in April 2023. The team also designed a new expansion of the Scientific Center Kuwait, which will open in 2024, with a few other developments around the world currently in the early stages.
The museum also runs professional development for K-12 educators, partners with organisations such as NASA and the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and facilitates visiting scientists and artists-in-residence programmes.
Richardson’s passion for science education and communication also extends beyond her work at the Exploratorium. In 2022, she published a children’s book called Octopuses Have Zero Bones, which is full of quirky science facts, and has another children’s book in the works, all about colour.
“There’s one way to think about science communication, and that is to transmit knowledge or information from scientists to the public,” says Richardson. “[But] I prefer to think about it as opening doors for people to engage with the world around them, to be their own critical learners and to trust their ability to observe and inquire and to make sense of the world.”
That passion shines through Richardson’s influence on the direction of the Exploratorium. “The Exploratorium continues to do work that I consider to be crucial today,” she says. “It’s not about telling people what to think and what to do – it’s putting the tools in their hands to engage with the world and to feel confident that they can understand it.”
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Story by Kylie Ahern
Image: Shannon Kelli
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