Orpheo Group believes in equality, accessibility and inclusion. Its main goal is in fact to make art accessible for everyone. But when it comes to deaf people, audio guides, the main tool provided by Orpheo Group, are just useless. How can deaf people receive an explanation of the artworks while looking at them, just like everyone else? Unmute Art is the answer.

Orpheo Technologies for Museums in collaboration with Ente Nazionale Sordi (Italian national agency for deaf) presents the first exhibition fully accessible to deaf people by creating video guide in which works present themselves in sign language: in this way it’s possible to look at the work and at the same time receive an explanation of its meaning. As it happens for hearing people.

The mission of Orpheo Group is to make art accessible to everyone, from tools for kids to the newest technologies for everyone. Italian deaf people community is the largest in Europe but Italian Institutions are not inclusive: for example Italian Sign Language is not officially recognised and the government does not provide technologies or tools for them in many aspects of life, including art and museums. That’s why Orpheo Group decided to take a stand by creating an experience especially for them.

Real deaf actors cast themselves in the role of the most important works of Andy Warhol thanks to total body painting and graphic and compositing work that faithfully reproduces the pictures.

You just frame the work and the video guide is activated by image recognition.

Unmute Art was presented on the opening day of “The True Essence of Andy Warhol” exhibition and has been available for its entire duration (26 September 2019 – 23 February 2020).

Naples’ deaf community took part at the presentation of the video guides and tried them out.