Event Details

THEMUSEUM is a registered charitable organization and our mandate is reflected in our Mission Statement: To scan the globe for fresh cultural content and use it to stage experiences that stimulate transformative connections for our audiences. Our Vision, simply put, is: To awe, inspire and enlighten.

"This application is for “Giraffes: A Heightened Experience”, taking place June 1, 2024, to January 30, 2025. “Giraffes” is a family-friendly exhibition and festival of events for all ages, created with input from Knowledge and Programming Partners including the Anne Innis Dagg Foundation and the Toronto Zoo. The exhibition will occupy ~ 5,000 sq feet of gallery space with accurate, up-to-date STEM learning material and fun experiential activities that will bring guests up close to giraffes and their world. The exhibition takes inspiration for its choice of subject matter and delivery style from recent presentation trends at major science centres in Canada and the U.S. These major, high-resource centres have been spotlighting individual species: the Canadian Museum of Nature’s Wolves!: Shapeshifters in a Changing World or the American Museum of Natural History’s The Secret World of Elephants. Programming details include:

(1) “Giraffology” artefacts and didactic material will include banners, graphics, touchable 3- D printed bones, replicas of giraffe body parts, and other artefacts of giraffe studies provided by the Anne Innis Dagg Foundation, grounding guests in an accurate understanding of the African keystone species. The Toronto Zoo may also share some of the graphics/didactic materials from the interpretive area in their Giraffe House, and also are working on an option to set up a Zoolife live cam in THEMUSEUM gallery as a window into the Zoo’s giraffe habitat, home to Mstari, Kiko, and their children Amani Innis Dagg (b. 2020) and Matumaini (b. 2022).

(2) experiential and hands-on activity stations: the “Camelo” station, recreating the Ford Prefect Dr. Dagg used; an immersive film room, with film footage of giraffes in their Savannah habitat; a VR headset station for guests 13 or older, where they can make choices for moving through Savannah landscapes alongside giraffes; ‘Spot the Spots’ magnetic wall memory game; ‘Run Like a Giraffe’ challenge station; and a camouflage photo op station, where guests can don giraffe-style camouflage to blend in against a patterned background;

(3) a citizen science component will invite visitors to draw parallels between the task of the Anne Innis Dagg Foundation—the preservation of Savannah habitats as a necessary condition for giraffe conservation—and the need for similar protections in Canadian biomes for Canadian species;

(4) a curriculum-linked education module on habitat preservation and animal conservation for school groups;

(5) speaker presentations and dialogues, including multiple presentations/appearances from the Anne Innis Dagg Foundation (featuring Dr. Dagg herself, now 91 years old, alongside her daughter Mary);

(6) a Goat Yoga session that puts participants up close and personal with Canadian ungulates;

(7) film screenings of The Woman Who Loves Giraffes (2018);

(8) Junior Giraffe Club event (courtesy of the Anne Innis Dagg Foundation);

(9) Toronto Zoo presentation on the past ten years of Masai Giraffe program at their facility;

(10) giraffe craft series for daily Creation Stations;

(11) giraffe-themed Science Stage show for summer 2024;

(12) modified “Maverick the dinosaur show” with a special giraffe guest;

(13) Little Ray’s Nature Centre presentation with a habitat conservation message; and

(14) Collaborations with other organizations to create events related to citizen science initiatives for habitat and species protection and data."