In Northern Kentucky University’s art gallery, grad student Ben Lloyd rolls the dice on a board game he designed for blind and visually impaired individuals.
“It’s an action-adventure board game. It will have players exploring a castle starting at the bottom and kind of fighting their way up to the top. It’s a haunted castle, “ says Lloyd.
The educational game is part of NKU’s latest art exhibit called Tactile Revolutions. Director of Gallery and Outreach at NKU, Paige Wideman, said the Art exhibit features over 80 displays. She said it was organized in collaboration with the Clovernook Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired and is interactive.
“Typically, artwork you can’t touch. And this entire exhibition is tactile. You have to pick it up and experience it,” explained Wideman.
Wideman said the exhibit includes The History of Clovernook, accessible artwork, Braille, and 3D models.
She points to the beginning of the exhibit in the large open gallery where there are several life-sized, brightly colored 3D models of human heads titled Meet the Team.
“Meet the team is one of the categories that you’ll see. And each of the individuals that works at Clovernook and contributed to bringing the show to its present state all have their heads 3D printed. There’s a machine that scans, and then the files go into the machine and it slowly kicks out their representation. So, to get to know who they are, you go up, and you start feeling the face and the head. We’ve got one individual, Blue, who was very helpful with helping me understand how things needed to be and kind of working with me to curate,” said Wideman.
On this day, NKU alum and editorial coordinator at Clovernook, Blue Adams, demonstrates how to use a brailler to write their name. A brailler is similar to a typewriter.
Blue said BVI, or Blind or Visually Impaired individuals, were involved in every step while putting this exhibit together. Blue explains why Tactile Revolutions is valuable on many levels.
“It really highlights the BVI community and aims to give better information on who is blind or visually impaired and what do they need for a resource to be truly accessible to them. But it’s really making everything accessible for everybody because everybody can benefit from tactile design and tactile production methods and strategies,” explained Blue.
Another team member is Sam Foulkes, Director of Braille Production and Accessible Innovation at Clovernook. He said Tactile Revolutions highlights Clovernook’s work over the last decade. While the Center has been in Cincinnati for more than 100 years, Foulkes said it serves people around the world. He picks up one display from the exhibit of a green building. Sam said it’s a skyscraper.
“This is the KICC Tower in Nairobi, Kenya. It’s an iconic part of the city’s skyline. It’s been there for about 50 years. And when we started distributing this to schools, many of the teachers are blind or visually impaired in that region at schools for the blind. Some of them were extremely emotional because they got to experience this building and see what it looks like in a way they’ve never seen it before,” said Foulkes.
Accessory consultant Tom Babinszki's company does lots of accessible 3D design and production and does contract work for Clovernook. His company created several pieces for Tactile Revolutions.
“What we do is try to give an experience for blind and visually impaired people through touch of things they otherwise couldn’t experience,” explained Babinszki.
The 49-year-old has been blind since birth and said accessible 3D has changed his life. Babinszki, who lives in Cleveland, said Tactile Revolutions is worth the trip.
Tactile Revolutions at the NKU Art Gallery is scheduled to stay open through September 17th.
