The RISD Museum was an essential part of my childhood. On weekends and school vacations, I wandered the galleries, old-school Utrecht sketchbook in one hand, pencil in the other, closely followed by my mother just in case I carelessly brushed up against something priceless. As I’ve grown, I’ve felt the Museum growing with me. This ever-evolving place never fails to fascinate me. Coming here at least twice a week for the past year, I’ve memorized the galleries, I know which elevator buttons fail to light up when you press them, and I’ve finally learned that I’m never going to be able to sneak a green tea past the front desk- even if I promise not to spill it. This museum is a safe place for me, a space to cultivate my thoughts and opinions, and place where I am always, no matter how many times I visit, struck by something new and exciting that I hadn’t seen before. As I’ve grown and changed, it’s been important to me to have a place that’s remained concrete but not stagnant, a place I always feel welcomed. Next year I’ll be in a new city, getting adjusted to a new school-college!-and searching for new places to call my “home away from home,” but nothing could ever replace the home I have made for myself here.
I’ve noticed that as the tail-end of high school approaches, when seventeen turns to eighteen and the winter of senior year slips by both too fast and too slow, the dispositions of high school students change entirely. Being on the cusp of adulthood creates a feeling of anxiety combined with curiosity, of excitement with a hint of fear about what college and the subsequent “real world” might hold. My school offers a “school-to-career” internship opportunity for second-semester seniors- a program designed for the sole purpose of getting us out of our uniforms and into a real-world working community of our choice. I spend Wednesday mornings at the RISD Museum with S. Hollis Mickey; an assistant educator for gallery interpretation. I was able to connect with Hollis through RISD Art Circle (RAC) over the past year. At my internship, I’ve started a “works of the week” social media campaign that will feature objects that are currently or have previously been on view in the Museum. I also get a glimpse into Hollis’s day-to-day work life and have the opportunity to learn about her career path.
Choosing to intern at the Museum has proved to be just as smart a decision as I thought it would turn out to be. Not a single one of my friends wakes up on Wednesdays as excited as I do, or feels as happy about where they decided to spend their time- and I think that says a lot; both about my experience at the RISD Museum as well as how important it is to love what you do.
Another part of my Museum experience is the RISD Art Circle (RAC). RAC provides opportunities for high school students to have professional experiences within the Museum, and to get involved in ways that weren’t quite possible before the debut of the program in October 2014 (Eleven other students and I are proud to call ourselves the first members of RAC). The program, led by educators at the Museum, allowed us to talk to all kinds of different people within RISD- from a textiles major at the College to graphic designers at the Museum and the Museum’s director himself. We learned the creative as well as logistical process of opening an exhibition and became involved in the launch of the exhibition Drawing Ambience. We created interactive posters that we handed out during a Design the Night opening event for the exhibition and we developed a web page; complete with an architecture-themed playlist and interviews we had conducted with architects. RAC is such an unusual program that, when prompted by someone who wonders why I spend Saturday mornings in an art museum, I find it challenging to find the words both to describe it adequately and do it justice.
The RISD Museum has provided me with the invaluable experience of a working environment where I’m taken seriously, something that doesn’t occur as often as it should for high school students as they discover their interests and grow their own identities.
When I was younger, I associated the RISD Museum with safety, comfort, and beauty, but I’ve recently assumed new roles here that go far beyond “visitor.” I’ve traded my coat tag in for an ID, a symbolic representation of taking on new professional roles and accepting new creative and intellectual challenges.
I’ve realized through my experiences here how important it is to surround yourself with everything you love -and nothing that you don’t- however you can. To purposely place yourself in situations where you are happy indicates a healthy relationship with oneself, which is important no matter how old you are or how young you aren’t. The Museum provides freedom for individuals discover creativity itself and to grow within their creative practice. I hope the Museum finds its way into more young people’s lives- or, rather, that they’ll find themselves here- wandering the galleries, maternal hand in one arm, BLICK sketchbook tucked under the other.
India Timpani
RISD Museum intern and RAC member, Bay View Academy 2015