Royal Jelling

UNESCO World Heritage listed Jelling, with its rune stones and burial mounds, is one of the most important cultural-historical sites in Denmark. The Royal Jelling exhibition centre covers more than 1000 square metres in the city center. It houses an exhibition that explores Danish history and mythology and, crucially, the mysteries of the Viking kings Gorm the Old and Harald Bluetooth.

Royal Jelling is not a traditional archaeological museum, but one that makes archaeology accessible as a continuous and active process. Archaeological artefacts and Viking legends are presented in a diverse and media-rich exhibition. Visitors can travel back to the earliest days of Jelling and immerse themselves in lives of the Vikings through ten different exhibition areas and forty media exhibits.

Drawings are a central motif throughout the exhibition. The drawing robot presents knowledge not as an incontrovertible fact, but illustrates that knowledge is a process. It can be 'fed' with images of new finds and discoveries that it draws on the wall. A projected sculpture in the centre of the Mythology Room referencing Yggdrasil, the Vikings' mythological tree of life brings viking legends to life.

The defining interaction and storytelling idea behind the exhibition is to enable dual use of the media elements: Individual visitors can discover the stories through personal engagement, but a group visit harnesses the space as a storytelling tool. Custom tablet interface lets the guide take over the interaction and bring the space to live in support of the dialogue amongst the group.

The encounters over aeons that have unfolded around the berth in a viking long house to the high tech narrative spaces today, it is the human storytelling that is the most captivating medium of all.