ABSTRACT
Visitors experience museums according to the organisation of access and views. Both visibility and accessibility are critical to viewing and understanding since, in the museum, individual objects are presented in relation to others: visitors are exposed to patterns of co-visibility unfolding over time as they make their paths through the exhibitions. This chapter looks at an aspect of the organisation of museum space that has not been dealt with comprehensively in the existing literature, the relation between spatial and visual configuration. Recent museums, in which the relation of viewing to moving is complex, are contrasted with a more traditional layout. This leads to an exploration of the following questions: what are the significant differences in the relationship between moving and viewing and what are their effects? How does the architecture of the museum project meanings through the interaction of access and view? The comparative analysis of a range of cases studies shows that visibility, like movement, is a fundamental property of the spatial design of museums and can be used, independently or in association with movement, to create the museum’s characteristic experiences and distinctive character.
