Questacon's new hands-on exhibition brings back classics from decades past
The National Science and Technology Centre on the shore of Lake Burley Griffin has been helping young people engage with science, technology and innovation through interactive exhibits for the past 37 years.
With some 500,000 people visiting the national institution each year, there's a lot of memories to be made.
Questacon director Jo White has some fond recollections of her own.
"It's a very beautiful memory of our two sons coming here. I think we had to go put [extra] money in the parking meter to extend our stay, they just loved it," she said.
Ms White credits the Awesome Earth exhibition with inspiring her youngest son's career in science.
That nostalgia is what Questacon is hoping to evoke with its latest exhibition, featuring a new take on some old favourites from the past three decades.
ZAP! CLANK! POW! uses a colourful comic book theme to link 17 interactive displays centred around electricity, machines and motion.
Kids can get hands-on with the displays, including by creating flying machines and lifting their own body weight with pulleys.
"It's a bit like a gallery arcade … lots of interactive exhibits, there's beautiful colour and a lovely story, which feels very much like a cartoon script," Ms White said.
"I'm hearing there's some lovely dad jokes generally part of it as well."
Senior exhibition designer Ella Cameron said the comic book design already appeared to be a hit.
"We have actually found during the visitor testing phase that people actually stop and engage a bit longer with the graphic panel," she said.
"So people are more likely to take away not just the experience, but read the background behind whatever they're interacting with."
She said the entire exhibition had been designed and manufactured in Canberra, at the Ian Potter Foundation Technology Learning Centre.
"Where we can, we [design and] build things in-house ... and outsource when we need specialist skills," she said.
The new exhibit has been in development for two years, with the project involving a team of about 20 scientists, writers, designers, engineers, welders and joiners.
"Even once we have the idea, there is an infinite number of ways that it can look and also an infinite number of ways visitors can interact with it," Ms Cameron said.
"We want to make sure that the design is intuitive and safe and also that it is fun."
Last year the Australian government department responsible for Questacon was charged after a child's hands allegedly caught fire at the science centre, leaving them with serious injuries.
Ms Cameron said safety was always a large part of the design process.
"People often engage in things in a way that you wouldn't necessarily assume. You've got to think through all the different scenarios to make sure it is safe," she said.
Composed of entirely modular displays, the exhibition is designed to be packed up and showcased in different locations.
It will be on show in Canberra until February before travelling around Australia.
"We really want to reach as many as we can across Australia with science and technology, and exhibitions like this make it accessible," Ms White said.
"It might be the moment that sparks their curiosity in a career in STEM, or at least an interest in science and technology into the future."
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