Volunteering & Education Programs
Sustainabattle — Educational Card Game
Digital Artist — Photography & Marketing
5 Roles · Internship & Freelance · August 2024 – April 2026
The Harn Museum of Art shaped how I think about creative work, institutional responsibility, and the relationship between art and community. Over nearly two years, I held five distinct roles across four departments, moving from student educator and program coordinator to graphic designer, digital artist, and research assistant. Each role built on the last, giving me cross-departmental fluency.
What made my time at the Harn unique was the trust the institution placed in me. I was trusted to organize gallery programs to visitors of all ages, lead and manage volunteer teams, design an original educational card game, Sustainabattle, from concept to print-ready production, produce digital assets that would represent the museum publicly, and conduct original academic research alongside the Contemporary Curatorial Department.
The Harn taught me that the best cultural work happens when the people behind the scenes are just as invested in the experience as the visitors who walk through the door.
Across all five roles, the throughline was the same: use creative skills to make art more accessible, more engaging, and more meaningful for the widest possible audience. Whether I was coordinating a monthly public event, designing marketing materials, improving the museum's digital archive, or synthesizing curatorial research — every task was in service of that same goal.
The Harn also gave me something harder to quantify: a deep understanding of how institutions work. I learned how departments collaborate, how programming decisions get made, how public-facing work is balanced with behind-the-scenes operations, and how a museum's identity is maintained across every touchpoint — from the gallery wall to the social media post. That systemic perspective informs everything I create.
As a Museum University Student Educator (MUSE), I developed and facilitated interactive gallery programs and educational activities for visitors of all ages — designing visitor-centered content tied directly to current exhibitions and the permanent collection.
I collaborated on programming to increase community engagement and accessibility, conducted outreach, and contributed to grant-related initiatives. This role gave me the foundation for everything that followed — a deep understanding of how museums communicate with their audiences and what it takes to make art genuinely accessible.
As Program Coordinator, I stepped into a leadership role — coordinating 5+ monthly public events, leading and managing volunteer teams, and designing all marketing materials for programming. I built and maintained relationships with partnering organizations, acting as a bridge between the museum and the broader Gainesville community.
My work in this role directly increased visitor engagement by 15% — a measurable outcome that reflected not just effective logistics, but genuine audience connection through thoughtful programming and outreach.
As a freelance Graphic Designer, I took on one of the most ambitious projects of my time at the Harn: designing Sustainabattle — a 100+ card interactive educational game built entirely around the museum's permanent collections and sustainability themes.
I handled the full design system: individual card design across multiple categories, packaging design, promotional materials, and the instruction booklet. I conducted artist research and wrote all interpretive content, sourcing and organizing collection assets through the TMS database. The final product was a polished, print-ready game that was used in real museum programming.
As Digital Artist, I produced 100+ digital assets spanning event photography, promotional video, print-ready infographics, and web content. I maintained the accuracy of eMuseum collections data, delivering both print- and web-ready materials to consistent professional standards.
My improvements to the museum's digital archiving workflow increased accuracy and accessibility by 77% — a measurable impact that was adopted as standard practice. This role sharpened my ability to work at high volume without sacrificing quality, and to manage complex digital asset pipelines within institutional constraints.
As Research Assistant in the Contemporary Curatorial Department, I conducted in-depth research on the emergence and inclusion of AI in cultural institutions — applying critical thinking skills to assess and synthesize complex findings across museum studies, institutional critique, and cultural evolution in exhibition practices.
I collaborated directly with curators to support exhibition development and interpretive strategy, translating academic research into actionable insights for curatorial planning. This role gave me a rare dual perspective — as both a practitioner making content and a researcher analyzing how institutions evolve.
Volunteering & Education Programs
Sustainabattle — Educational Card Game
Digital Artist — Photography & Marketing
