Introductions

As a first blog post we have been asked to give introductions and potential thoughts about thesis topics. 

I started in museums during high school through the Capstone program, internships benefiting students who are highly motivated in their career fields, where I spent half of my school day volunteering at the Oliver Archive Center on the grounds of Chautauqua Institution. There I worked with the Thomas Edison and Lewis Miller family photograph collections and managed all incoming inquires for other facets of the photograph collection. My work primarily focused on receiving, analyzing, documenting, digitizing, and caring for the Thomas Edison/Lewis Miller family photographs and its corresponding family genealogy. I then went on to write and submit my first contract to the Chautauqua Institution Board of Trustees, purposing a paid position for the rehousing and digitization of the Chautauqua post card collection. The proposal was accepted and the project was completed before the 2013 Chautauqua season began.

From there I moved to Rochester, NY to start my college education where I immediately began volunteering at the George Eastman House International Museum of Photography and Film. I spent six months volunteering in the Technology collection, labeling and helping to identify cameras. Simultaneously, I also volunteered in the Department of Moving Image during their Monday screenings in the Dryden Theater. These experiences lead me to becoming close friends with Ania Michas, former conservator of the Polish National Archives, and beginning my first contract with the Kay R. Whitmore Conservation Center. The six-month contract was through the Saving America’s Treasures grant for the rehousing of the famous Southworth and Hawes Daguerreotype collection. After completing my portion of the contract, I was asked back by the conservation center, six months later, to complete a second contract in digitization and deterioration identification of the daguerreotypes. I would later go on to be accepted into the museum’s, highly competitive, Department of Photography Undergraduate Internship.

Currently, I have been assigned to work on rehousing, identifying, and cataloging the Colorama collection, also at the George Eastman House, which I may potentially use towards a project-based thesis. However, there is another potential proposal that I may accept and use instead.

I look forward to hearing about what everyone else is considering on over these next two semesters!

Kenzie Mencer in the Kay R. Whitmore Conservation Center after helping to complete the Save America's Treasures Project