How Museums Like OMA Are Opening Their Doors to Visitors With Vision Impairment
For at least a decade, if not longer, museums that once acted primarily as stewards of art and artifacts have been tackling thorny challenges related to accessibility. We know how to hoard our treasures; how to share them equitably is something we’re still puzzling out. Economic accessibility is probably the easiest hurdle, even if free admission for all—the obvious and much-debated solution—isn’t the cure-all people assume it to be. But engaging audiences beyond those that museums have, rightly or wrongly, traditionally been designed for is much more difficult.
At least 2.2 billion people globally live with vision impairment, according to the World Health Organization. Approximately 6 million Americans have some degree of vision loss; 1 million have legal blindness. And the visual arts are just that: visual. Sitting at my desk, glasses perched on my nose and wondering if my relatively mild myopia qualifies me as one of the 6 million, I’m embarrassed to admit that I had never considered what an art museum might offer someone on the spectrum of blindness.
As it turns out, institutions have devised many ways to engage visitors with vision impairment and vision loss. Across museums, there are touch-friendly tours that facilitate the tactile exploration of selected works, 3D-printed models of artifacts for handling, increased-illumination days, apps that connect low-vision and blind visitors with people who describe art in real time, audio tours designed specifically for those with vision loss and sensory events that incorporate non-visual elements such as sound or scent into exhibitions. During verbal imaging tours, a visitor can explore the museum with a docent who provides detailed descriptions of artworks and context through conversation.
The Art Institute of Chicago has a dedicated space for non-visual art appreciation, the Elizabeth Morse Touch Gallery, though it includes only a handful of sculptures. In 2021, the Casselberry Sculpture House in Florida staged an entire exhibition, “ReVision,” geared toward people with visual impairment, that invited others to don blindfolds and interact with the art as it was designed to be experienced. “Sight isn’t the only pathway to understand art,” Carol Wilson, the Smithsonian American Art Museum’s Lunder Education Chair, pointed out in an interview with NPR, and there’s no one accommodation that works for every visitor. Simply describing an artwork to someone who has been blind since birth, for example, can be an empty, if well-meaning, gesture. Some visitors will benefit from magnification technology, others from tactile displays and still others from audio guides. The takeaway is that more is better when it comes to accommodations.
Very few museums, understandably, have explored technological ways to help those with visual impairments actually see the art. There aren’t many such technologies, and there are many types and degrees of vision loss. Here, too, what works for some won’t work for all. But when assistive technologies do work, the rewards can be profound, Orlando Museum of Art chief curator Coralie Claeysen-Gleyzon told Observer. “It’s not just hearing about visitors’ experiences; it’s the reward of knowing people got the chance to experience something most of us take for granted.”
In recent months, OMA has held three “Art for All Eyes” events during which visitors with vision impairment could check out an eSight Go, a wearable assistive device that mitigates central vision loss caused by twenty different conditions, including macular degeneration and diabetic retinopathy. “The device projects the image near the eyes, flooding the retinal surface with that image,” Jamie Barendsen, marketing manager for eSight, explained. “For someone with central vision loss, the center part of vision doesn’t work properly, but the peripheral vision is still functional. eSight uses that peripheral vision to send the complete image to the brain, which then synthesizes it. Essentially, it allows the brain to ‘fill in’ what’s blocked.” Combined with magnification, it can also help people with blind spots or occlusions see more fully.
She demonstrated the eSight Go during our conversation. I had expected something like a VR headset; it’s closer to a bulky pair of sunglasses. You’d notice if someone nearby was wearing it, but it wouldn’t be long before your mind tuned it out. “From an art appreciation perspective, it lets the wearer actually see the colors, textures and details of a work, not just its outline or shape,” Barendsen said. “It restores the gift of detail and the ability to fully engage with the world again.” Institutions, she added, are interested in how the eSight Go can support accessibility.
The collaboration between OMA and eSight was inspired by Orlando-based artist Kelly Joy Ladd. In 2020, she suffered a traumatic brain injury that left her with disrupted vision. During her recovery, she tried visiting the museum’s annual “Florida Prize in Contemporary Art” exhibition, but she couldn’t see the work and left in tears. “I could see, but everything was distorted—my vision shook violently from side to side,” she told Observer. “I’m recovering, and I’m so much better than I was, but during that period, I really struggled with it.”
For the first few months after her injury, all she could do was lie on the couch, close her eyes and meditate. She couldn’t read, watch TV, look at her phone or computer, or even listen to music—it was all too stimulating. Engaging with her art—multi-layered, detailed and highly textured sculptural works made with paper—also proved overwhelming for a long time. “Eventually, I forced myself to start making work again, and it became a kind of vision therapy for me. At first, I could only work for ten minutes at a time, and the process was very slow.”
Eventually, though, she returned to the museum and the “Florida Prize” exhibition, not as a visitor but as one of the ten selected artists. “Contemporary art isn’t about teaching art history in the traditional sense—it’s about engagement, and that means accessibility and representation,” Claeysen-Gleyzon said. “Kelly’s story was so compelling; her experience made us think about what it would mean to enable people to see again.” When the museum’s PR firm heard Ladd’s story, they suggested OMA learn more about eSight’s glasses. “It was a natural fit, both for accessibility and for our goal of being a museum at the forefront of technology.”
According to Barendsen, the company is beginning conversations with institutions about how the glasses could fit into accessibility programs. Claeysen-Gleyzon confirmed that OMA is actively exploring how to make the eSight Go sustainably available to visitors. “It’s a valuable piece of equipment, so there are challenges—cost, maintenance, expertise,” she said. eSight reps attended the low-vision day events, presumably to troubleshoot but also to see what kind of impact the technology would have in a museum setting.
Or outside it. “The stories are incredible,” Barendsen said. “At the first one, one man’s wife explained he hadn’t seen her face in over ten years. When he put on eSight, he saw her clearly—for him, it wasn’t just about seeing art, it was about seeing his family again. His daughter said he usually stayed home because he couldn’t see, but this opened his world back up.” At the second event, another man with Stargardt disease—the condition that inspired the engineer behind the technology, Conrad Lewis, to create it—tried it. He had been struggling to keep his job, Barendsen explained, reading emails on massive screens with letters blown up 14 inches tall. “He put on eSight, went quiet, and finally said, ‘I don’t believe my eyes.’”
Cognizant that the eSight Go isn’t a fix for every type of vision loss, Ladd also created artworks that visitors at the low-vision days could engage with through touch, adding another layer of accessibility. The Orlando Museum of Art promoted the events through its usual channels, including Lighthouse of Central Florida, a nonprofit that works with people living with vision loss and blindness, though Claeysen-Gleyzon said word-of-mouth played a significant role in their success. “People even reached out to ask whether the glasses would work for their specific conditions,” Claeysen-Gleyzon said. “Clearly, there’s demand for this kind of programming.”
“Just because someone can’t see well doesn’t mean they should lose the ability to experience art,” Barendsen said. “Technology can open those doors.” And when it can’t, meaningful personal encounters can help fill the gap.
“I had a beautiful experience with a little girl who was too small to wear the glasses,” Ladd recounted. “I had samples of my work for people to touch. She and I spent time together, and later her mother told me she went home and started making ‘Kelly art’ by cutting and gluing paper. That was really special.”
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