Camille Claudel and Shaping the Visitor Experience

Reflections on interpretive planning at the Getty Museum

By Tuyet Bach

In the spring of 2024, the Getty Museum featured a retrospective exhibition of the artwork of Camille Claudel. Our Exhibition team was well into the interpretive planning process by late 2022, allowing time for critical discussions about shaping the visitor experience through intentional approaches to content, interpretation, and design. 

The Artist

As the exhibition would be the first retrospective of Camille Claudel’s work in North America in over two decades, our team saw an opportunity to introduce her art and story anew to audiences in Los Angeles. We discussed existing popular conceptions of Claudel – gleaned from a body of related literature, films, and exhibitions – many of which pivot around Auguste Rodin and obscure Claudel as an artist. Access to new research published by curators from the Art Institute of Chicago and the Getty further enriched our discussions about how we might incorporate socio-historical information. These discussions helped us reach a shared goal of centering Camille Claudel as the protagonist of her own story. The exhibition gallery texts (example below) aimed to convey Claudel’s independence and innovation as a sculptor, while addressing the personal, societal and professional barriers she faced.

Seeing and Sensing

The Getty Museum’s collection includes one artwork by Camille Claudel, a bronze sculpture titled Torso of a Crouching Woman. With that small bronze alone, it’s possible to experience the intensity, physicality, and emotion of the artist’s vision. When the Interpretation team viewed the Claudel exhibition checklist and object images, it became clear that the diversity of subject, scale, materials, and techniques employed by the artist presented an opportunity for a more immersive visitor experience. During exhibition design meetings (which included the Curatorial, Design, Conservation, and Interpretation teams), we exchanged wide-ranging perspectives about aesthetics, safety, accessibility, and audience needs. For visitors to feel welcomed and encouraged to look closely at the works of art, we advocated for a gallery environment that would spatially encourage visitors to approach and look at the sculptures. The final exhibition design used circular or curved elements to counterbalance the angular architecture of the galleries, and to encourage movement around the sculptures. This approach allowed visitors to reveal views of the sculptures through their own movements, to sense scale relative to their own body, and to closely observe the materiality of the objects.

Touch!

To further encourage multisensorial engagement within the exhibition, we were excited to develop a tactile display for visitor exploration of the materials and techniques Claudel used in her creative practice. Following several planning discussions and exploration of materials in the conservation lab, we decided to replicate a foot from the Getty’s Torso of a Crouching Woman by Camille Claudel. We chose a foot so that visitors could easily recognize the human form and make a visual connection to the original sculpture on display in the exhibition. The Conservation team scanned and printed 3D models of the foot and then engaged two artists to create small-scale models in terracotta, plaster, marble, and bronze. Our goals with this display were to reach those visitors who are tactile learners and to provide an overview of the primary materials and sculpting techniques used by Claudel. 

The Interpretive Content department evaluated the touch display with an informal visitor survey developed by Azad Thapa, our 2024 Graduate Intern, and conducted by our team. The objective of the survey was to understand the role of the display in enhancing visitor engagement. Over the course of three days in the galleries, we interviewed 24 visitors who interacted with the display. Below are a few of the key findings:

• Most visitors responded that the touchable display effectively enhanced the exhibition experience, allowed them to gain a deeper understanding of Claudel’s artwork, and accommodated various learning styles.
• Most visitors rated the touch signage positively and appreciated the placement of the interactive area at the end of the exhibition. A few visitors suggested increasing the size and placement of the signage to improve visibility. 
• Visitor comfort ratings were positive overall. One visitor noted they felt “welcome” to touch, but not “comfortable” due to concerns about sanitation. Several visitors described psychological barriers surrounding touch in museums.
• Most visitors valued the touch display for deepening their sensory connection to materials used by Claudel.
• Visitors asked for more tactile elements at the Getty Museum. They offered suggestions for the inclusion of full-scale replicas, and the inclusion of both developed and raw materials. One visitor asked for materials that could be held, not only touched.

The visitor evaluation capped a rewarding collaborative experience in the development of interpretive materials for the Claudel exhibition. It reminds me that our circle of intention is not complete until we have heard directly from our visitors.