Hermitage - Next level in museum education

The Hermitage Amsterdam is one of Amsterdam's biggest attractions, and well known for its diverse exhibitions and unique collaborations. With thousands of Dutch and international visitors, art education is an essential part of their mission. On a continuous basis they allow children to discover their own artistic abilities.

Now, the Hermitage opened their most unique exhibition so far: Dutch Masters from the Hermitage. The world's leading collection of Dutch Golden Age paintings outside the Netherlands. A perfect opportunity to bring the education program to the next level. That's why they challenged LAVA: How can we literally bring the exhibition into áll classrooms in the Netherlands?

We developed a concept that invites children to create their own ‘Dutch Masters’ exhibition. This comes with responsibility for all parts; from research to curation, and from design to communication. Using 21st-century skills like the use of digital technology, critical thinking and teamwork, they create an exhibition that comes to life in Virtual Reality. To be able to walk virtually through your own exhibition is really exciting. But we wanted to bring it another step further. So we brought the virtual and physical world together by making it literally part of the exhibition and 3d projected all creations in a special decorated room in the museum.

LAVA created the concept, storyline and design in close collaboration with the Hermitage. Arjan Scherpenisse was responsible for the web development. Ruud op den Kelder brought the exhibitions to life in Unity and Klasse TV did the promotion.