Week one.
Highlights from the week include: picking out Laidman prints for the show opening today, putting up publicity posters on time for a change, installing the exhibit in record time, tromping through snow in flats to get frames, and being gently reminded, via Modigliani's Gypsy Woman painting, that yes indeedy I want to do this for a living. Which is always appreciated. Especially because my feet were COLD.
So there's the gallery opening this afternoon, a poetry slam tonight, and I'm wearing a Sri Lanka t-shirt with a men's chambray button-down. For the hipster win.
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Lines Written in Recapitulation
"Lying in bed would be an altogether perfect and supreme experience if only one had a colored pencil long enough to draw on the ceiling." -G.K. Chesterton
Day eleven. Last (real) day of work for the semester.
Appropriately, we're de-installing (not un!) all the exhibits. I feel like there's a metaphor in here somewhere, but I'm all English major-ed out for the semester.
The process is simple enough. Take down piece. Remove nail. Spackle. Paint. Lather, rinse, repeat. The Lockhart Gallery is done in an hour.
Corinne and I get to talking about grad school and internships and I feel that old familiar panicky feeling of "CRAP! What if I don't get health benefits! DRAT! What if I'm stuck in a job I hate with thousands of dollars of student loans! POOIE!" By the end of our conversation, I have resolved to marry Prince Harry, get him to bribe the Met into letting me hang out there forever, and maybe sleep in that French bed they have kickin' around. This definitely seems more feasible than grad school and getting an internship this summer.
Let me repeat: CRAP! DRAT! POOIE!
There is, however, a tiny ray of hope. Dad plays tennis with a curator at the Met who has some sway with the Intern Advisory Board. I will almost certainly not get that internship. But my chances have gone from none to slim. I have fingernail in the door, so to speak.
Being an almost-adult is stressful.
Day eleven. Last (real) day of work for the semester.
Appropriately, we're de-installing (not un!) all the exhibits. I feel like there's a metaphor in here somewhere, but I'm all English major-ed out for the semester.
The process is simple enough. Take down piece. Remove nail. Spackle. Paint. Lather, rinse, repeat. The Lockhart Gallery is done in an hour.
Corinne and I get to talking about grad school and internships and I feel that old familiar panicky feeling of "CRAP! What if I don't get health benefits! DRAT! What if I'm stuck in a job I hate with thousands of dollars of student loans! POOIE!" By the end of our conversation, I have resolved to marry Prince Harry, get him to bribe the Met into letting me hang out there forever, and maybe sleep in that French bed they have kickin' around. This definitely seems more feasible than grad school and getting an internship this summer.
Let me repeat: CRAP! DRAT! POOIE!
There is, however, a tiny ray of hope. Dad plays tennis with a curator at the Met who has some sway with the Intern Advisory Board. I will almost certainly not get that internship. But my chances have gone from none to slim. I have fingernail in the door, so to speak.
Being an almost-adult is stressful.
Saturday, November 6, 2010
Being Young and Green
"Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up." -Pablo Picasso
Days eight, nine, and probably ten.
I've lost count.
I'm given a bit of an inkling that yes, putting together exhibitions will be more fun than just measuring and nailing when I'm (sort of) in charge of helping set up the El Sauce, Nicaragua photo exhibit in Lederer. This inkling was just that, a teeny tiny itsy bitsy hint, because Cynthia asked my opinion on how the wall with the author photo and bio best looked and then took my advice.
And I get to handle cool artwork and go to fancy galas and feel important in my conservation gloves...but I'm having my doubts.
I love putting together exhibits, but there is so much tedium associated with a collection. And if I want to stay in Smalltown, USA and work in that small-but-challenging-and-rewarding art museum/gallery in Somewhere Nearby City, there is going to be a LOT of tedium if I want a job where I can set up exhibitions and do research. So basically? I'm not sure what I want to do anymore.
I love all the learning involved and the joy and gratitude that comes from seeing a beautiful painting and then understanding what it means and I want to be able to impart all of that to others people. Chee-ZEE, I know.
Maybe I just need to relax.
I almost forgot my actual fail of the week: hanging up posters announcing a reception for an exhibition half an hour before it started.
Everything will be totes fine.
Days eight, nine, and probably ten.
I've lost count.
I'm given a bit of an inkling that yes, putting together exhibitions will be more fun than just measuring and nailing when I'm (sort of) in charge of helping set up the El Sauce, Nicaragua photo exhibit in Lederer. This inkling was just that, a teeny tiny itsy bitsy hint, because Cynthia asked my opinion on how the wall with the author photo and bio best looked and then took my advice.
And I get to handle cool artwork and go to fancy galas and feel important in my conservation gloves...but I'm having my doubts.
I love putting together exhibits, but there is so much tedium associated with a collection. And if I want to stay in Smalltown, USA and work in that small-but-challenging-and-rewarding art museum/gallery in Somewhere Nearby City, there is going to be a LOT of tedium if I want a job where I can set up exhibitions and do research. So basically? I'm not sure what I want to do anymore.
I love all the learning involved and the joy and gratitude that comes from seeing a beautiful painting and then understanding what it means and I want to be able to impart all of that to others people. Chee-ZEE, I know.
Maybe I just need to relax.
I almost forgot my actual fail of the week: hanging up posters announcing a reception for an exhibition half an hour before it started.
Everything will be totes fine.
Sunday, October 17, 2010
Inland
"What garlic is to salad, insanity is to art." -Augustus Saint-Gaudens
Cynthia's phone is broken, so she sends me and Carinne an email asking if we can work on Friday. Things need to be packed, there's an exhibit to be set up, and I still have to finish the accession reports. Apparently the storage room lock is broken and I get to learn another "wholly unseemly way of getting in."
Day seven.
Imagine my disappointment when the lock was fixed.
Imagine my disappointment when I realize I need more copies of the condition reports and I've already interrupted Cynthia once, twice during her interview with the newspaper. So instead of doing what I should have done and gone to ask for the Xerox key, I fill out the accession forms and wrestle with tissue paper to pack the large prints. The roll is roughly as tall as I am, I haven't the foggiest where to find the razor blades (remember those?), so I'm just tearing it off of the roll in a not-so-dignified fashion.
Eventually the interview is finished, the condition reports are copied, and I'm sent to help pack up an exhibit.
Except we have no packing tape.
"Um, yeah just be creative. There's some tape still stuck to the old bubblewrap."
Excellent.
Carinne and I wrap up these paintings, re-wrap them because we did it incorrectly, and attempt to stuff them into the packing boxes.
"There was some space in between them so I...got creative with the styrofoam."
"Well let's add some bubblewrap too."
Did you know that you should tape a box flap down at least six times?
Cynthia's phone is broken, so she sends me and Carinne an email asking if we can work on Friday. Things need to be packed, there's an exhibit to be set up, and I still have to finish the accession reports. Apparently the storage room lock is broken and I get to learn another "wholly unseemly way of getting in."
Day seven.
Imagine my disappointment when the lock was fixed.
Imagine my disappointment when I realize I need more copies of the condition reports and I've already interrupted Cynthia once, twice during her interview with the newspaper. So instead of doing what I should have done and gone to ask for the Xerox key, I fill out the accession forms and wrestle with tissue paper to pack the large prints. The roll is roughly as tall as I am, I haven't the foggiest where to find the razor blades (remember those?), so I'm just tearing it off of the roll in a not-so-dignified fashion.
Eventually the interview is finished, the condition reports are copied, and I'm sent to help pack up an exhibit.
Except we have no packing tape.
"Um, yeah just be creative. There's some tape still stuck to the old bubblewrap."
Excellent.
Carinne and I wrap up these paintings, re-wrap them because we did it incorrectly, and attempt to stuff them into the packing boxes.
"There was some space in between them so I...got creative with the styrofoam."
"Well let's add some bubblewrap too."
Did you know that you should tape a box flap down at least six times?
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
If I Should Learn, In Some Quite Casual Way
"If I didn't start painting, I would have raised chickens." -Grandma Moses
Day six.
The mere fact that I have to wear white gloves for work today means that it's going to be roughly a thousand times better than last time. I have the feeling that the smugness of punching in the code to the storage room, carrying tools (i.e. a measuring tape and an archiving pen), numerous folders, and a stack of prints through Brodie is never going to lose its charm. Not to mention the white gloves were either stuffed conspicuously in my back pocket or being worn the entire time.
It's a regular day at the office. Filling out accession reports, being silently aggravated about forgetting my laptop with my music, swearing when I'd stack a print without labeling its collection number, handling some seriously SWEET lithographs (really, I WANT one), memorizing the address of donor Janet L. after filling it out eighteen times...all the nicely therapeutic aspects of gallery work.
But still. Kinda boring.
I nabbed the pair of white gloves, by the way. I figured it was high time I carried a pair around in my bookbag. Don't worry, Cynthia, I'll return them at the end of the year. But they're just too cool to NOT carry around.
Day six.
The mere fact that I have to wear white gloves for work today means that it's going to be roughly a thousand times better than last time. I have the feeling that the smugness of punching in the code to the storage room, carrying tools (i.e. a measuring tape and an archiving pen), numerous folders, and a stack of prints through Brodie is never going to lose its charm. Not to mention the white gloves were either stuffed conspicuously in my back pocket or being worn the entire time.
It's a regular day at the office. Filling out accession reports, being silently aggravated about forgetting my laptop with my music, swearing when I'd stack a print without labeling its collection number, handling some seriously SWEET lithographs (really, I WANT one), memorizing the address of donor Janet L. after filling it out eighteen times...all the nicely therapeutic aspects of gallery work.
But still. Kinda boring.
I nabbed the pair of white gloves, by the way. I figured it was high time I carried a pair around in my bookbag. Don't worry, Cynthia, I'll return them at the end of the year. But they're just too cool to NOT carry around.
Conscientious Objector
"One must from time to time attempt things that are beyond one's capacity." -Auguste Renoir
"So...apparently the collection has somewhere in between eight to nine thousand prints that we didn't know about."
"Oh crap."
Day five. I show up in Cynthia's office under the assumption that I'll be doing some condition reports, maybe handling some sweet prints, definitely wearing (the favorite) white gloves...ya know. Nope.
Instead, I'm handed a stack of papers, the collection list, and told to find which ones match up. Apparently the incompetence of Cynthia's predecessor was not to be believed and there are several THOUSAND prints floating around somewhere in the collection. The problem is, we're not sure which ones we know about.
So I trot off to the seminar room, under the assumption that the 60-page list of prints is alphabetized and it'll take maybe 20 minutes. Much to my chagrin, there is no apparent order in how the list is organized. What. So. Ever. Of course, I discover this after Cynthia has peaced out for the gym. And Vicki isn't in her office.
Being the devoted and pathetic intern that I am, I make an attempt. To search through a 60 page document with size (I'm being serious) 6 font. Maybe 8. But almost definitely 6. That is not in any particular order. After about ten minutes of this, with zero results, I decide to pretend that it's not there and wait for Cynthia to get back so I can use the beautiful Command-F function. I spend the remaining time taping pages together.
Eventually Cynthia gets back and I get to Command-F the crap out of the now alphabetized version of the print list. Thank goodness I gave up the chase early beforehand. Out of the 230ish pieces on the insurance list and the 6000 pieces on the print list, TWO match up. TWO. That's right, people. TWO.
Let's give a prolonged, very very sincere round of applause for laziness. It saved my ass.
"So...apparently the collection has somewhere in between eight to nine thousand prints that we didn't know about."
"Oh crap."
Day five. I show up in Cynthia's office under the assumption that I'll be doing some condition reports, maybe handling some sweet prints, definitely wearing (the favorite) white gloves...ya know. Nope.
Instead, I'm handed a stack of papers, the collection list, and told to find which ones match up. Apparently the incompetence of Cynthia's predecessor was not to be believed and there are several THOUSAND prints floating around somewhere in the collection. The problem is, we're not sure which ones we know about.
So I trot off to the seminar room, under the assumption that the 60-page list of prints is alphabetized and it'll take maybe 20 minutes. Much to my chagrin, there is no apparent order in how the list is organized. What. So. Ever. Of course, I discover this after Cynthia has peaced out for the gym. And Vicki isn't in her office.
Being the devoted and pathetic intern that I am, I make an attempt. To search through a 60 page document with size (I'm being serious) 6 font. Maybe 8. But almost definitely 6. That is not in any particular order. After about ten minutes of this, with zero results, I decide to pretend that it's not there and wait for Cynthia to get back so I can use the beautiful Command-F function. I spend the remaining time taping pages together.
Eventually Cynthia gets back and I get to Command-F the crap out of the now alphabetized version of the print list. Thank goodness I gave up the chase early beforehand. Out of the 230ish pieces on the insurance list and the 6000 pieces on the print list, TWO match up. TWO. That's right, people. TWO.
Let's give a prolonged, very very sincere round of applause for laziness. It saved my ass.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
A Visit to the Asylum
"Surely nothing has to listen to so many stupid remarks as a painting in a museum." -Edmond and Jules de Goncourt
Day three.
I did not think it could get much more tedious than writing hundreds of condition reports on prints of dead cardinals' tombs. This thought was quickly overturned when my Friday afternoon was spent painting the trim of the McClellan House. Painting the trim grey, no less. Poor Minerva and Carinne. They had to stay for more than my two hours.
Day four.
I pretentiously stumble (if that's possible) from church to the 9th Annual Art Gala in excruciating heels I haven't worn since senior prom. Candles line the walkway, a string quartet is cycling through the same four or five songs in the hallway, and I'm assigned a tray of deviled eggs to pass around. Minerva is standing in the gallery, looking bored, and holding a tray of hors d'oeurves that include something wrapped in bacon and something with shrimp. When the tray of deviled eggs is sufficiently depleted, I sprint (well, more like quickly limp, with very good posture) to the kitchen, where everyone who wants to avoid Geneseo's elite is munching on appetizers and massaging their sore feet.
President Dahl begins his address and all the sophisticated adults turn their attention to the various speeches in the gallery. Minerva and I take this as our cue to steal apple cider and food from the tables, while silently cursing Lockhart's creaky floors.
The rest of the evening is spent alternately snitching cake, making pleasantries about the exhibit, and teaching an older man with a British accent how to eat a deviled egg. (Shove the whole darn thing in your mouth, turn your head away from polite company, chew, swallow. Lather, rinse, repeat.)
After saying my goodbyes and avoiding the distribution of leftover food, I head home. I decide that the next time I waitress for a gala, I will wear better shoes and force everyone to eat whatever foodstuffs I've got on my arm. I will also eat beforehand.
Day three.
I did not think it could get much more tedious than writing hundreds of condition reports on prints of dead cardinals' tombs. This thought was quickly overturned when my Friday afternoon was spent painting the trim of the McClellan House. Painting the trim grey, no less. Poor Minerva and Carinne. They had to stay for more than my two hours.
Day four.
I pretentiously stumble (if that's possible) from church to the 9th Annual Art Gala in excruciating heels I haven't worn since senior prom. Candles line the walkway, a string quartet is cycling through the same four or five songs in the hallway, and I'm assigned a tray of deviled eggs to pass around. Minerva is standing in the gallery, looking bored, and holding a tray of hors d'oeurves that include something wrapped in bacon and something with shrimp. When the tray of deviled eggs is sufficiently depleted, I sprint (well, more like quickly limp, with very good posture) to the kitchen, where everyone who wants to avoid Geneseo's elite is munching on appetizers and massaging their sore feet.
President Dahl begins his address and all the sophisticated adults turn their attention to the various speeches in the gallery. Minerva and I take this as our cue to steal apple cider and food from the tables, while silently cursing Lockhart's creaky floors.
The rest of the evening is spent alternately snitching cake, making pleasantries about the exhibit, and teaching an older man with a British accent how to eat a deviled egg. (Shove the whole darn thing in your mouth, turn your head away from polite company, chew, swallow. Lather, rinse, repeat.)
After saying my goodbyes and avoiding the distribution of leftover food, I head home. I decide that the next time I waitress for a gala, I will wear better shoes and force everyone to eat whatever foodstuffs I've got on my arm. I will also eat beforehand.
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