The DropIN PopUP Waiting Room Project
September 22 - January 27, 2013, University of Kansas Spencer Museum of Art

Artists: Marguerite Perret, Bruce Scherting, Robin Lasser, and James Stone
with contributions from public health professionals, researchers and practitioners.

---

What Are You Waiting For?
What kind of healthcare system, access, facilities,
and services do we desire or expect for ourselves?

For others?


Healthcare delivery and access is one of today’s most pressing societal issues. This installation explore this complex topic through
the psychologically rich context of the waiting room: the place--
often anxious, frustrating, and isolating—where people wait to interface with the medical system. 

The DropIN/PopUP Waiting Room Project turns this uncomfortable dynamic upside down by creating a shared space where emotions
and experiences are expressed, recorded, collected, and represented. Community members—people just like you—help shape the message of this interactive artistic collaboration, which will evolve over the

next few months as Museum visitors contribute their observations
and experiences.

The installation manifests itself in two spaces in the Museum.
At the PopUP Superhuman Voting Station, near the museum
entrance, visitors can vote on healthcare issues and express their ideas, concerns, and desires via a short ten minute questionnaire. Data from visitor responses are transformed into an animated visualization called Growing Concerns that is projected in the DropIN Waiting Room installation, upstairs in the 20/21
Process Space Gallery. 

Completing the loop from interface to display and audio (Talking Table), the DropIN/PopUP Waiting Room Project aims to stimulate critical thinking and dialogue about healthcare provision and access
as visitors reflect on the two intertwined narrative threads: what do we want or expect from healthcare; and through the Talking Table, what do providers, policy makers, and researchers bring to the table?