With their fingertips, Marina and Jose Pedro pored over a small-scale mannequin of Barcelona’s Sagrada Familia church in an exhibition which permits the blind to find a few of the world’s best-known monuments.
“There are simply so many tiny particulars! And what a wierd roof,” enthused Jose Pedro Gonzalez as he explored the wood reproduction of Gaudi’s spectacular basilica.
Marina Rojas mentioned that she “by no means imagined the Sagrada Familia like that”.
“It’s very shocking, since you get a normal concept of what the monument is like, what the area inside is like,” she added.
The Madrid Typhlological Museum — from the Greek “tuphlos” that means blind — homes 37 reproductions of world monuments which can be listed as world heritage websites.
It was arrange in 1992 by ONCE, Spain’s highly effective nationwide organisation for the blind which has 71,000 members.
Made from wooden, stone, steel or resin, the fashions are accessible to all guests — whether or not blind, sighted or partially sighted — giving them a hands-on, sensory expertise of the structure.
“There’s no different place on the earth with a museum like this,” mentioned information Mireia Rodriguez, who’s herself visually impaired.
“There are a lot of different museums designed for visually impaired guests, however they don’t have this type of assortment.”
ONCE runs a lottery and a few extremely popular scratchcard video games which usher in 2.5 billion euros ($2.7 billion) a 12 months and pays the salaries of its 72,000 staff, six out of 10 of whom have some kind of incapacity.
The funds are additionally used for different investments, such because the museum, which in 2023 welcomed 16,000 guests,
In addition to the fashions, the museum additionally options artworks by people who find themselves visually impaired and a show of instruments and tools used from the early nineteenth century till the Eighties to assist blind folks entry tradition, together with books in Braille.
Getting nearer to tradition
After wandering by way of a room housing fashions of Spain’s best-known sights such because the Alhambra palace in Granada, Madrid’s Royal Palace and the Santiago de Compostela cathedral, Rojas branded the exhibition “actually marvellous”.
One other room is full of world landmarks such because the Taj Mahal, London Bridge, the Statue of Liberty, Rome’s Colosseum, the Parthenon in Athens, the Eiffel Tower, the Kremlin and the Outdated Metropolis of Jerusalem to call however just a few.
“Irrespective of how a lot they clarify to you, you possibly can’t actually get a correct picture of what it’s like… and that creates plenty of frustration, so the very fact there are areas like that is incredible,” mentioned Rojas, whose eyes can solely see a bit of sunshine.
“I want there have been extra possibilities to the touch such artistic endeavors,” the 32-year-old mentioned.
“Contact offers you plenty of data, even when most comes by way of sight, so it’s crucial to the touch,” she advised AFP, her information canine Boston standing at her aspect.
For curious palms, nevertheless, he’s firmly out of bounds.
“Don’t stroke me, I’m working,” warns a message on his harness.
Particulars like jewelry
It was whereas feeling the dome of the Taj Mahal that Gonzalez’s palms lingered longest, his fingers taking within the mannequin’s clean curves manufactured from the exact same Makrana marble because the dazzling white mausoleum in northern India.
“I knew the Taj Mahal was manufactured from marble, however the very first thing that stunned me was touching it and the way chilly it felt, that the mannequin itself was additionally manufactured from marble,” the 60-year-old who has been blind since beginning mentioned.
“I really like these oriental domes and all of the work that goes into carving the marble and the little particulars,” mentioned Gonzalez, his palms gliding over the monument’s rooftops and facades.
“It’s, in fact, a constructing and never a chunk of gold jewelry, however in lots of respects, it looks like one,” he smiled.