Internship

So far I have greatly enjoyed my internship at William King Museum. Since this is the first time that I have written about it, I should probably relay the projects that I have been working on thus far. When I first started my internship I was working with the Head Curator (at the time), Elyse. I remember my first day we were painting stands and the walls for the up coming exhibition "Mischief Making." This show was an unique show displaying the works of Jake Cress, and his beautiful, yet quirky, craftsmanship skills of his period style chairs, dressers, and grandfather clocks. I was shocked by the beautiful bright blue color that we were painting the walls, but Elyse explained to me that she was trying to recreate a room from the MoMA that displayed period furniture from the 1800s, and that they actually used this bright blue back in the day. After helping her install a chair rail (quite a feat) I worked on a few odds and ends after the show opened. One day I worked in the store and rearranged pictures and merchandise and another day I was entering artists into the database. After Elyse left in the beginning of February I have been working under Lelia. I just completed documenting a series of NASCAR photographs by David Lee Harvey into the William King Permanent collection. I have been getting to know how to use the data base, PastPerfect, which stores all of their archival information electronically. I have also been working down in the archives and figuring out how to file the information down there. It seems as though Elyse was the only one who truly knew the inner workings of all these intricate and complex data systems, but the more I have been working with them, the more I have been able to understand them. I really enjoy my internship and the people I work with. William King is a beautiful Museum and I feel as though sometimes it is easily overlooked and not appreciated for the cultural diversity and appreciation that it brings to South West Virginia.