Scenographies of the past and museums of the future: from the wunderkammer to body-driven interactive narrative spaces

This paper offers an overview and discussion of the numerous innovative technological solutions adopted for the exhibit: "Puccini Set Designer" ("La Scena di Puccini"), organized with the support and collaboration of Milan's renown La Scala opera theater. The exhibition used a wide range of state-of-the-art technologies to convey most effectively to the audience Puccini's work as set designer. For the co-presence and coordinated use of several technologies that transform the visitor from passive spectator to orchestrator of the museum experience, it marks a step towards the "museum of the future". A true innovator in opera set design, Giacomo Puccini broke new ground through the use of both modern technologies - such as electric stage lighting - and a narrative structure closer to the audience of his day. Similarly, drawing inspiration from the Puccinian set, this exhibition reinterprets the museum space as an exquisitely scenic place where lighting, choreography, narrative rhythm, costumes and colors are produced with the aid of state-of-the-art technologies. The museum space enhanced by these new narrative tools based on innovative technologies resembles a stage set where the main characters are the objects themselves, a set complete with special effects and stage tricks expressly designed to delight the spectator, and keep his interest alive.