Release Date: June 26, 2017

National Gallery of Art Awards 18 Summer Internships

Participants in the National Gallery of Art’s 2017 summer internship program.
Front row, left to right: Adefolakunmi Adenugba, Jiete Li, Alyssa Bralower, Emma Cantrell, Katharina Ann Biermann, Sarah Reiff Conell, Maureen O'Connor, Amy Lewis Castine, and Carly Wooten
Back row, left to right: Lauren Graves, Lizzie Brevard, Danielle Abdon Guimaraes, Sarah E. Almond, Sarah Leonard, Kelsey D. Martin, Allison Cheffer, Kirsten Derks, and Charline Fournier Petit

Washington, DC—The National Gallery of Art welcomed 18 emerging professionals to participate in its 2017 summer internship program, a nine-week opportunity for graduate-level and postgraduate students to work on projects directed by a Gallery department head or curator. The group was selected after a competitive application process and includes individuals from 12 states and four foreign countries. The summer internship program began Monday, June 5, and will conclude on Friday, August 4, 2017.

Interns are chosen for this rigorous program based on a strong interest in museum work, outstanding academic achievement, and letters of recommendation, among other criteria. In addition to placements in traditional areas—curatorial, education, conservation, and administration—the Gallery also offers internships in horticulture, graphic design, architecture, publishing, archives, music, and public safety. As part of their regular work schedule, interns attend a biweekly seminar that introduces them to the broad spectrum of museum work at the Gallery, including departments, staff, functions, and programs.

The internship program is supported by individual gifts and endowment funds, and is administered by the department of academic programs in the division of education. Information about the summer internship program, as well as about other Gallery internships and fellowships, is available at www.nga.gov/opportunities/interns-and-fellows.html or by calling (202) 842-6257.

2017 National Gallery of Art Summer Interns

Danielle Abdon Guimaraes
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Danielle earned a BA (art history) from Rollins College and is currently a PhD candidate (art history) at Temple University. Most recently Danielle was a graduate intern at the Getty Foundation. She was previously the Fred Hicks Fellow at the Cornell Fine Arts Museum on the campus of Rollins College. This summer Danielle will perform research on selected 16th-century Venetian paintings for the department of Italian paintings.

Adefolakunmi Adenugba
Marietta, Georgia
Adefolakunmi recently earned a BA (business administration and art history) from Emory University. She has interned at Creative Milieu Consulting Group and Newell Brands. In 2014 she participated in the Andrew W. Mellon Summer Academy at the High Museum of Art. This summer Adefolakunmi will assist the education publications department with the planning of a new digital resource about the Gallery's American art collection. She will also work on the development of a teacher packet for the upcoming exhibition of photographs by Gordon Parks.

Sarah E. Almond
Durham, North Carolina
Sarah earned a BA (literature) from the University of North Carolina at Asheville. She is currently pursuing an MA (public history) at North Carolina State University and an MSLS at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. For her summer internship in Gallery Archives, Sarah will engage in preparatory work for several digitization and web-based projects relating to Gallery history.

Katharina Ann Biermann
Roseville, California
Katharina recently earned a BA (art history, medieval studies) from St. Olaf College. Previously, she was a summer intern at The Met Cloisters and a collections intern at Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence, Italy. Katharina will begin coursework for MLitt (research) at the University of Glasgow this fall. This summer she will work with staff in the curatorial records and files department to integrate documentation on accessions from the Corcoran Gallery of Art into the Gallery's collection database.

Alyssa Bralower
Lisle, Illinois
Alyssa earned a BA (photography and English) from Illinois State University and an MA (art history) from the School of Art & Design at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where she is currently pursuing a PhD (art history). Alyssa has been a gallery assistant at Figure One Gallery and editorial intern at the University Galleries of Illinois State University. For her summer internship Alyssa will assist the department of photographs in researching and organizing upcoming exhibitions on Sally Mann as well as women photographers working from the 1920s through the 1940s.

Lizzie Brevard
Tupelo, Mississippi
Lizzie received a BA (art history) from Georgetown University and is currently pursuing an MA (art history) at George Washington University. She has interned in Washington, DC, at the National Portrait Gallery and the National Museum of African American History and Culture. For her summer project Lizzie will assist the department of photographs in researching and organizing an upcoming exhibition on Gordon Parks.

Emma Cantrell
Seattle, Washington
Emma received a BFA (community education) from Massachusetts College of Art and Design and is currently pursuing an MA (museology) at the University of Washington. Previously Emma was a post-baccalaureate fellow in museum education at Smith College Museum of Art in Northampton, Massachusetts. She has interned at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Bakalar & Paine Galleries at MassArt, and the Woodland Park Zoo. This summer Emma will assist the education division with a visitor study on the Frédéric Bazille exhibition by collecting interviews with visitors, conducting observations in the exhibition, and beginning qualitative data analysis.

Amy Lewis Castine
Bairdford, Pennsylvania
Amy earned a BA (art history) from the American University of Paris. She recently received an MA (art history with a concentration in museum studies) from Virginia Commonwealth University. Previously Amy interned at the Maier Museum of Art at Randolph College in Lynchburg, Virginia, where she contributed to Arts Fusion, a program for people with dementia and their caregivers. This summer Amy will assist the education division with a new program, Just Us, that provides interactive, discussion-based experiences in the galleries for people with early-stage dementia and their caregivers.

Allison Cheffer
San Bruno, California
Allison earned a BA (art history) from the University of California, Berkeley, and is currently pursuing a JD at the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. This summer Allison will work in the personnel office, assisting human resource attorneys in the preparation of cases before the EEO Commission, the Merit Systems Protection Board, and the Federal Labor Relations Authority.

Sarah Reiff Conell
Seguin, Texas
Sarah earned a BA (art history) from the University of Texas at Austin and an MA (art history) from the University of Pittsburgh, where she is currently pursuing a PhD (history of art and architecture). Previously Sarah was a preservation intern at Landmarks Preservation Guild, Austin, Texas, and an education intern at the McNay Art Museum, San Antonio, Texas. This summer she will assist the department of prints and drawings in updating collection records.

Kirsten Derks
Amsterdam, Netherlands
Kirsten earned a BA (art history) from Radboud University, Nijmegen, Netherlands, and is currently pursuing an MA (technical art history) at the University of Amsterdam. Kirsten has held internships in technical art history at the Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp (KMSKA) and the Mauritshuis in The Hague. This summer Kristen will work with conservation scientists in an ongoing project to inventory, document, and interpret the archive of more than 3,500 microscopic paint samples.

Charline Fournier Petit
Chicago, Illinois
Charline earned a Diplôme de Premier Cycle from the École du Louvre, Paris, and a Licence de droit from the Université Panthéon-Sorbonne, Paris. Recently she received an MA (humanities) from the University of Chicago. Charline has interned at the Louvre, département des objets d'art, Paris, and volunteered at the Art Institute of Chicago in the department of European painting and sculpture. This summer Charline will work with Gallery curators and conservators to study and interpret objects from the permanent collection of sculpture and decorative arts—chiefly Italian (15th and 16th century) and French (18th and 19th century) works.

Lauren Graves
Darnestown, Maryland
Lauren earned a BA (art history) from the University of Rochester and an MA (art history) from Temple University. She is currently pursuing a PhD (art history) at Boston University, where she is a Dean's Fellowship recipient. Previously Lauren was a curatorial intern at the Institute of Contemporary Art at the University of Pennsylvania. This summer Lauren will assist the department of special projects in modern art in planning and researching a forthcoming exhibition project that explores the intersection of crafts and fine art in the mid-20th century.

Sarah Leonard
Wilmington, Delaware
Sarah earned a BA (art history) from Wesleyan University, an MA (historic landscape studies) from the University of York in the United Kingdom, and an MA (art history) from the University of Delaware, where she is currently pursuing a CTPhD (curatorial track program in art history). Sarah has interned in curatorial departments at the Delaware Art Museum, Harvard Art Museums, and Thomas Jefferson's Monticello. This summer Sarah will assist the American and British paintings department in planning and researching an upcoming exhibition and publication devoted to James McNeill Whistler's Symphony in White, No. 1 (1862).

Jiete Li
Beijing, China
Jiete earned a BA (art history and museum studies) from Smith College. She recently completed an MA (art history, criticism, and conservation) from the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University. Previously Jiete was the recipient of the Alice Williams Carson summer internship at the Toledo Museum of Art. This summer she will present gallery talks and assist the art information program by working with volunteers and researching and preparing responses to queries from the general public. She will also work with the department of academic programs to prepare a Frédéric Bazille exhibition study day.

Kelsey D. Martin
Loveland, Colorado
Kelsey earned a BA (sociology) from the University of Colorado, Boulder, and an MA (art history, minor in women studies) from the University of New Mexico. She is currently pursuing a PhD (art history) at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. This summer Kelsey will assist the department of image collections in cataloging, inventorying, and digitizing the library's collection of reproductive prints of works of art.

Maureen O'Connor
Woodbridge, Virginia
Maureen earned a BA (history and English, minor in art history) from the University of Virginia. She is currently pursuing an MA (art history and museum studies) at Virginia Commonwealth University. Previously Maureen interned in the director's office at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond. This summer Maureen will assist education staff with the annual Teacher Institute.

Carly Wooten
Welcome, North Carolina
Carly earned a BA (studio art and psychology) from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and an MA (management) from Wake Forest University. Most recently Carly was a graduate consultant at the Piedmont Craftsmen Gallery in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. She was previously an intern at SAS Institute Inc. in Cary, North Carolina, and an artist's apprentice in the studio of Afshin Naghouni in London, England. This summer Carly will intern in the Gallery's travel office.

Press Contact:
Christina Brown, (202) 842-6598, [email protected]