A new experience at Petit Jean
Petit Jean State Park has a new visitor center. You’ll figure that out as soon as you walk through the doors and look around.
The 17,000-square-foot space, which quietly opened in December, includes a nicely stocked shop with Arkansas-made gifts, camping supplies, books about the region, food, and drinks, a multipurpose space, offices for the park staff, and a gallery—with a wall of windows that allow fine views of Bailey Lake—filled with exhibits on the park’s history and geology.
“An exhibit space like the one in our new visitor center at Petit Jean State Park is a huge project, taking several years from the start of research to full design, production, and installation—and all of that has to align carefully with the design and construction of the building too,” says Kelly Farrell, chief of interpretation and program services for Arkansas State Parks.
Architecturally, the center echos its Great Depression Civilian Conservation Corps origins with a huge stone fireplace between the east and west wing, along with stone and painted cement siding and a metal roof.
“In all aspects of a project like this, there is a lot of behind-the-scenes planning and work that happens, more than the average person probably realizes,” says Farrell. “As exhibit project manager, I’m constantly learning from the various specialists involved. From the graphic designers I got insights into their illustration and color recommendations. From artifact curators I learned more about humidity and light management. From the architects I’ve learned how to study construction drawings and help ensure electrical, light, data, and HVAC components end up in the right places.”
An additional feature of the center is adding to Farrell’s learning curve: An audio description tour of the gallery to benefit visitors who are blind or have low vision. For this component of the project, “I count on our consultants at [Illinois-based exhibit designers] Taylor Studios and Audio Description Associates [in Takoma Park, Md.] to gain deeper understanding of best practices for designing for guests with blindness or low vision.”
Arkansas State Parks opened new museum visitor centers at Jacksonport State Park near Newport in 2019 and Hampson Archeological Museum
State Park in Wilson in 2018. Both have audio description tours available for their exhibit galleries. “Reception has been favorable, but use has been limited,” says Farrell. “Unfortunately with the covid disruption of the past year, indoor exhibit visitation has been affected. Hopefully that can pick back up in the coming year.”
Audio Description Associates describes how the program is developed:
“Audio description consists of language that conveys the visual images of exhibits and video for the benefit— the understanding and appreciation of the images—of visitors who are blind or have low vision. ADA believes that it is critical to the development of a quality program to have experienced users of audio description test a draft of the AD features before the program is finalized; this consultant must not simply be a potential user of the service, but a potential user of the service who is experienced in the use of and development of audio description programs.”
This is where I come in. My friend Cindy Huisman (you may know her from Little Rock’s Cantrell Gallery), whose vision has been affected by Leber’s Hereditary Optic Neuropathy, was chosen to be the above-described consultant. She needed a ride to Petit Jean to do a walk-though of the exhibit while listening to a draft of ADA’s script. So we loaded up my car with bagels, bags of almonds, sparkling water and sunny attitudes, then headed west on Arkansas 10.
Once Huisman and Farrell got to work, I wandered off on a self-guided tour of Petit Jean’s gorgeous grounds on a lovely spring-like day (I especially like the yurts on the edge of the RV park). A few hours later, I retrieved my friend; apparently the time she spent with the exhibit was productive.
“Cindy did a terrific job reviewing and advising about the audio description tour,” Farrell says. “She was
friendly and easy-going, which made it immediately easy for us to jump into working together even though we’d just met. It was a busy day in the visitor center, meaning it was noisy. However, that’s an ideal testing condition since that’s how it will likely be for any guest who uses the tour later.
“Since Cindy was reviewing a draft script—not a finished product—there was a deeper level of concentration required than if she was just visiting for pleasure. She had to listen carefully, process the instructions and information, trust that if the descriptions of how to navigate weren’t written accurately that I would keep her safe from collision with an object, and pause to provide feedback or suggestions.
“For most of the tour, she approved the script for accuracy, but in a few places she gave excellent feedback about parts that were confusing or could provide more detail—that’s exactly the insight we needed at this stage of testing.
“Further, she shared that as she navigated the tour, she also tried to think from the perspectives of friends and colleagues who have different levels of vision impairment than she does, which expanded some of the feedback she gave beyond her personal experience. I appreciate her thorough review and dedication to helping this project succeed.”
“I was honored to be selected
to help with this project,” Huisman says. “Advocacy of audio description is something I am passionate about, and with my background in technical theater [at Arkansas Repertory Theatre] and working in a gallery setting, it felt like it’s a good fit for me. I am incredibly impressed by the display in the new visitor center, and the audio description is thorough and very well written.”
A final delivery date for the audio description tour—a free service—to be up and running hasn’t been set, “but we are aiming for late spring,” Farrell says. “Guests will be able to check out listening wands at the front desk in the visitor center lobby, which will have the tour loaded on them. Detailed instructions about how to use the device are part of the introduction in the descriptive tour.”
Her goal: “To learn from every project we do in order to continue serving our guests better. The better we serve guests, the more appreciation they’ll have of our parks—which is imperative for long-term stewardship.”
Huisman agrees. “I look forward to other blind and low-vision visitors to the state park getting to experience this top-quality interactive display.”