Listen to Our Story at OMA

June 10, 2023

Accessibility at the Athens Olympic Museum

The Athens Olympic Museum starts the Listen to Our Story tours, a multisensorial exploratory experience that focuses on the equal inclusion of people with visual impairment with a guide and tells the stories of Agon and the Olympic Legacy.

Απτικό βοήθημα από τα εκθέματα του ΟΜΑ για επισκέπτες με οπτική αναπηρία. Στη φωτογραφία εμφανίζεται ανάγλυφο το σύμβολο των Ολυμπιακών Αγώνων: πέντε κύκλοι διαφορετικών χρωμάτων που μπλέκονται μεταξύ τους πάνω σε ένα λευκό φόντο. Στο κάτω μέρος, δύο χέρια διαβάζουν τις επιγραφές σε braille. Δίπλα τους κωδικοί QR και μικρές λεζάντες αναφέρονται στο έκθεμα.

About Listen to Our Story

Κοντινή λήψη από την ανάγλυφη απεικόνιση της λαμπαδοδρομίας όπως εμφανίζεται πάνω σε ερυθρόμορφο αγγείο της αρχαϊκής εποχής.

Listen to our Story is part of the educational program Agon, An Olympic Legacy and was developed by Off Stream and its partners for the Athens Olympic Museum through an exclusive grant from the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF).

Μέσα σε μια μακρόστενη αίθουσα του Ολυμπιακού Μουσείου, ένας ψηλός καραφλός νεαρός άντρας με ροζ κοντομάνικη μπλούζα στέκεται όρθιος με πλάτη στο φακό και μιλά σε 10 άτομα που κάθονται σε σειρά μπροστά του. Η μπεζ στολή που φορά η πλειοψηφία μαρτυρά πως πιθανότατα πρόκειται για προσωπικό του Μουσείου. Listen to Our Story is a multisensorial exploratory experience addressed to all visitors and in particular to persons with partial or total loss of sight accompanied by their guide. Using hearing and touch as the main senses, the visitors have the opportunity to get in contact with the History of Sports and the Olympic Games, from the ancient times to the present day, and enjoy a stimulating museum experience. Listen to Our Story features 30 stories including tactile representations of selected exhibits and audio narrations with descriptions of the halls and the exhibition sections of the Athens Olympic Museum.

Developing Listen to Our Story

For the development of the inclusive applications that comprise Listen to Our Story, Off Stream collaborated with a group of specialized professionals from the fields of arts, architecture, museology, audio description, accessibility, digital media as well as with people who experience different levels of visual impairment ensuring the adequacy and the functionality of the applied practices.

The project was implemented for the Athens Olympic Museum from September 2021 to March 2023 by Off Stream in collaboration with Mulo Creative Lab, liminal, Clio Muse Tours, Apolyto Creative Spot, Accessibility Support Academy, Leia Avraam, Marianna Desypri and Christina Skandali with the exclusive grant of the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF). liminal contributed to the accessibility of the Museum by creating the texts of the audio descriptions of the selected exhibits in Greek and English.

At the same time, training sessions were held for the Museum’s staff in order to be able to attend visitors with visual impairment in the Museum’s premises.

Exclusive Sponsor/Donor: Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF)