FILM 511–Imagining Digital Futures
for the Art Museum

• November 2021–March 2022
• Queen’s Students across all disciplines in years 2–4 are eligible to apply
• $825 stipend, 3.0 course credits, 120 hours
• AGNES and the Department of Film and Media partnership
• Applications are being accepted on a rolling basis
• Download the poster

This course is designed to get students involved in the pilot Youth Advisory Council of Agnes Etherington Art Centre and engage them in developing the future of Digital AGNES through brainstorming new templates and initiatives. Students will engage in hands-on activities and gain professional experience in an innovative institutional environment, leading to active and collaborative learning opportunities across disciplines. No experience with digital tools is necessary.

Students will engage with Agnes in a pivotal year of change as the new, future-oriented vision for the museum, Agnes Reimagined is mobilized to set a new paradigm for museological practices. The museum of the 21st century can no longer simply be a container of history as if history has no bearing on our changing contemporary world. Agnes Reimagined will be a dynamic culture-making hub and an active civic and social force—mobilizing the transformative power of art to create more equitable, inclusive, and sustainable worlds. It asks: what needs to be done now to ensure Canada’s future museums no longer look like those of Canada’s colonial past?

Guided by Agnes Reimagined, participating students will explore how a contemporary art institution works from the inside, delving into areas such as curatorial, collections and public programs through a digital lens. They will become acquainted with different ways in which museums, galleries and art spaces have been adapting to and expanding their operations within the digital realm in more accessible and inclusive ways. In close dialogue with Agnes’s team, students will form multidisciplinary groups to identify areas of development for the digital museum of the 21st-century.

Students will research online collections portals as co-creative spaces, innovations in digital publishing, uses of AR/VR and mixed reality experiences, and interdisciplinary digital lab spaces within museums. Students will produce research reports, and prototype interfaces and activities for Digital AGNES to inform new cutting-edge templates being implemented by the museum.