How Te Papa hopes to harness the power of AI

Courtney Johnston has relevance on her mind.

With an ever-growing collection of more than 2.5 million items, the chief executive of New Zealand’s national museum, Te Papa, hopes that generative AI can make those millions of taonga mean more to more people.

Speaking at an event hosted by software company Paperkite in Wellington this week, Johnston said it was hard to know how new technologies would impact the country’s cultural heritage sector.

“When I cast out 50 years or 100 years, it is fragile. [Cultural institutions will be] hard for communities to afford, they have ageing buildings, ageing infrastructure ... the through-line is the more we mean to more people, the more sustainable we become,” she said.

Experts have said AI could help cultural institutions reach new audiences, create more engaging experiences, and provide virtual access to exhibitions.

Johnston said the technology could help with cataloguing museums’ diverse collections into new languages for non-English speaking visitors. That, in turn, could see museums like Te Papa play a larger role in fostering language learning and revitalisation.

Bicultural Te Papa had been ensuring a mātauranga Māori lens was available for its collections. But it had more work to do for speakers of Pacific languages, she said. It’s hoped this could boost visitor numbers, which were still about 300,000 to 400,000 people per year below pre-Covid levels.

Johnston used the analogy of a constellation of stars when talking about how Te Papa’s collection could hold different meanings for different communities. “It’s all in the grouping and interpretation – that’s where the meaning lives.”

She hoped AI would help streamline complicated, human-led bookings that required juggling people, resourcing and rosters; and that it could improve its spacing issues by figuring out ways to more efficiently order items across its storage sites.

Johnston also confirmed that its new storage and research facility, housing more than 866,000 specimens of fish, reptiles and invertebrates in jars of alcohol, will be located in Upper Hutt.

Adrian Kingston, Te Papa’s head of digital channels, told the audience that AI could be used to help the museum improve its service evaluation. It gathered valuable data from its front of house staff, but this process was human-intensive.

There were also gaps in collection records, including many unidentified people in photographs, paintings and documents which AI could shed light on.

Johnston said Te Papa was a large energy user, and was conscious of being environmentally sustainable, but faced challenges around expenses for temperature regulation of its collections, and carbon costs for creating and freighting exhibitions. It hoped AI could create systems to help minimise or account for its carbon footprint for its digital services.

It also wanted to improve its access to its online records; so far about 1 million items had been digitised online.

Within the museum sector, there was nervousness around job losses as a result of AI. It was vital staff felt comfortable using generative AI, Johnston said.

To that end, Te Papa had recently issued directives to its staff on the safe and responsible use of the technology based on the Government’s new AI use guidance, and encouraged them to try new tools.

“When I cast out 50 years or 100 years, it is fragile. [Cultural institutions will be] hard for communities to afford, they have ageing buildings, ageing infrastructure ... the through-line is the more we mean to more people, the more sustainable we become.” Courtney Johnston Te Papa chief executive