Intern Spotlight
How does the experience you gained in this internship fit into your larger academic and professional goals?
Through this internship, I was able to obtain valuable experience in museum work. I also gained basic knowledge on art preservation mainly through proper strategies to store art in ways that natural elements like sun and water damage are minimized. I also gained valuable knowledge on different art mediums and telling signs on how to differentiate mediums with accuracy, especially the different types of prints. This was my first opportunity to dive into the art world like this, and I was grateful for how much I learned and that I could learn from local artists past and present.
What was an unexpected challenge you faced and how did you meet the challenge effectively?
I don’t know if I consider anything I did this summer to be “unexpected,” but the biggest challenge I faced was locating and cataloging the known Al Hausmann collection. There were over a hundred items of about 90 individual works that needed to be found and properly recorded. Collaboration was essential, and thankfully, Jenny Dawn was there to help me out with this giant task. There were two separate waves of donations to the KDAC, so those had to be sorted correctly into what had information, the first wave, and what didn’t have information, the second wave. I started with what was in the room that stored the permanent collection and catalogued about 20 pieces. 30 other pieces were all around the KDAC in bathrooms, in the apartment, on the grounds, and hidden in the adjacent room to the permanent collection that Jenny Dawn and I were able to properly identify using the information we had. There were still over 50 pieces that were unaccounted for, lo and behold, almost all of them were in three giant trifolds averaging about 20 items a piece. By working together, Jenny Dawn and I were able to identify each piece, assign the right accession numbers, give them their location, and create their digital and physical profiles.
What was a collection item you were particularly struck by or fond of? Why?
I was partial to someone’s personal collection of 56 turtle sculptures donated by her child. Some of the turtles were very cute, and it was interesting to see the variety of mediums used to create the turtles and the different cultures the turtles were inspired by. I just really loved seeing someone’s personal life passion. Al Hausmann’s “Flying Fishy” is my honorable mention. What a great name.
This is my favorite turtle:
Overall, I am extremely proud of the work that I was able to complete, and that it was considered excellent and exceeded expectations. I had a fantastic time working on this project and with Jenny Dawn over the summer and am honored that my work will serve the KDAC well. I am so, so appreciative and grateful to Brian, Jordan, and Jenny Dawn for this opportunity and experience that I will carry with me for the rest of my life. Thank you! 😊
Tell us about yourself, what you’re studying, your career aspirations, and why you applied for a summer internship with FAM.
My name is Kate Powell, and I am a Florence native. I am a senior History and Economics major at Berry College located in Northwest Georgia. I aspire to be a historic educator in some capacity, and my most ambitious goal is to complete a PhD in History to teach at a collegiate level. I’ve become increasingly interested in the importance of public education and the critical work national and local museums play in preserving art, culture, history, and scientific fact. I applied for an internship with FAM this past summer to develop further understanding of the behind-the-scenes tasks needed to keep museums running smoothly and to see if museum work was a true passion of mine through hand-on experience.
Describe the overall goal of your internship, how you managed it, and the ultimate results of the project.
I was tasked with creating a digital catalogue of the KDAC’s permanent art collection using a program called Catalogit. The goal was to give every inventoried piece of art a metaphorical “parking spot” in Catalogit along with a picture of the work, its accession number, any additional information known about the piece, and most importantly, its location. Time permitting, I was also tasked with creating a physical Object File Folder for each piece and organizing them in filing cabinets. I was provided with a working Google Spreadsheet created and filled in by the Art Director, Jenny Dawn Stucki, and catalogued an average of 30-40 pieces a week for about 2 and a half months. Steady work and direct collaboration with Jenny Dawn were how I managed to complete this project. Jenny Dawn was crucial to the amount of work I was able to complete with her extensive working spreadsheet that provided the information on every piece catalogued, as well as us working together to locate pieces and deduce their identities. She also provided an extra set of hands when working with bigger collections such as the Martha Marshall collection that was daunting in size, and the Al Hausmann collection that was daunting in quantity. Ultimately, I was able to create profiles on Catalogit for every piece inventoried as part of the collection and provide profiles with pictures, locations, and all known information for over 400 pieces of the art collection.
