Week 8:
Creativity Unlocked

August 7, 2016

We officially broke ground on putting in the new exhibit on Monday! Well, technically Brianna started on Sunday with her husband. But I still got to help with a lot of the work, and I got to explore my creativity!

Exhibit installation is hard work. We’ve moved heavy walls, lifted heavy drills, and have painted heavy cases. I returned home every night sore and exhausted, but even more in love with this internship than I was before. On Monday and Tuesday, I helped Brianna remove the rest of the objects and miscellaneous items from the gallery. We took down all the old panels, moved the display cases (also called vatrines) out of the way and vacuumed. On Wednesday, the walls were ready for removal. The museum hired a company called Labor Ready to send workers, as the walls are too heavy for us to move on our own.

Brianna requested three workers and we ended up with two, since the third called off at the last minute. They did a pretty good job, although they did take longer than we expected. That day was spent mostly standing around supervising and answering questions. There were some minor things that we fixed the next day, like adding extra brackets to make the walls more stable and straightening a wall that was slightly bowed. This is where the lifting of the heavy drill came in. Luckily I managed not to drop said drill on anything or anyone. Felicite, Alyssa, and I got to paint to vatrines as well. They are now a nice tan color which will look amazing with the wall colors Brianna chose!

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Throughout this whole internship I have felt my creativity slowly emerge from the dark recesses of my mind. My sisters and I are all gifted with artistic abilities, but I always chose to hide mine. This is mostly because I believed the only way to succeed in life was through academics. But my time at Cornell, and my two months at the AAMI have shown me just how wrong I have been. Museum curation does involve a lot of academic knowledge — research and writing skills are essential to the job. But so does exhibition design and panel layout. I’m also amazed at how Brianna uses creativity to solve everyday problems, like how to store objects, what to do when we run out of materials and things like that.

I’ve learned that creativity doesn’t necessarily mean sitting in a room drawing or painting. It can mean hard labor and a certain tone of writing. Through writing scripts, curating my own little exhibit, and helping design the temporary exhibit, my mind has expanded. Ideas and suggestions come easier to me now, and I even feel more confident in my academic abilities. This opportunity and the amazing people at the AAMI have definitely made a huge impact on my life. I am more sure than ever that this is the path I want to take in my life, and I am more confident than ever that I can succeed in it.

There’s still a lot to do at the museum for the new exhibit. The panels and walls have to be painted, and objects have to be installed. I’ll be sticking around for it all, and I can’t wait to see the final product!