Museum Studies Blog at Tufts University

Project Intern: Spring / Summer 2017 Cambridge Arts: Public Art

Cambridge Arts is seeking a spring and summer intern to assist with all aspects of its upcoming contemporary art series Common Exchange. A group exhibition of sound installations and performances, Common Exchange will feature 10 artist projects in and around the Cambridge Common from May – September 2017. Organized in honor of the park’s recent pathway renovations, each project that constitutes Common Exchange reiterates the park’s physical and ideological function as a connective space. Over the course of the summer, time-based and participatory works will occupy the Cambridge Common and its surrounding buildings to address connectivity and exchange in the twenty-first century, moving from interpersonal to communal and historical relationships. The public remains the central figure in each artwork to emphasize that it is participation and public discourse that ultimately shapes our civic spaces. Featured artists include: Andy Graydon, Paul Ramirez Jonas, Carmen Papalia, Aki Sasamoto, Kelly Sherman, Xaviera Simmons, Allison Smith, Julianne Swartz, and Lee Walton and Jon Rubin.

Common Exchange is made possible through multiple partnerships and sources of support, including the National Endowment for the Arts ArtWork Grant, VIA Art Fund, Elizabeth Firestone Graham Foundation, Cambridge Agassiz Harvard Community Fund, Berkshire Taconic, Artists’ Resource Trust, Massachusetts Cultural Council the Community Design Studio of LUCAD, Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts at Harvard University, the City of Cambridge, and Holosonics.

Description:
The Common Exchange intern will work closely with the Director of Public Art at Cambridge Arts, Lillian Hsu, and the exhibition guest curator Dina Deitsch. Duties will include organizing and keeping schedules for events and artists’ travel, project research for artists’ projects, attending meetings and public presentations, and providing general administration assistant to the curator and director.

Requirements:
The ideal candidate will have some prior experience in project management and/or in public programs in the arts as well as excellent organizational skills. An interest and knowledge of contemporary public art practices is a plus. A great and flexible attitude is absolutely required.

This position is funded by a stipend and would require an average of two days a week, which may include weekend or evening hours. Schedules are flexible and can be modified as needed. Course credit can be attained for select academic programs.

About Cambridge Arts:
Cambridge Arts (CA), also known as the Cambridge Arts Council, is the official arts agency for the City of Cambridge, MA. Established by City ordinance in 1974 and incorporated as a public non-profit in 1976, CA’s mission is to ensure that the arts remain vital for people living, working and visiting Cambridge. As both a service and presenting organization, CA accomplishes this mission by stimulating public awareness of and support for the arts, preserving and celebrating the City’s diverse cultural heritage, displaying art in public places, and developing opportunities to improve the overall aesthetic experience for residents and visitors of Cambridge.

Cambridge has one of the oldest percent-for-art public art programs in the country, established through the Cambridge Public Art Ordinance in 1979. To date, over one hundred artworks have been publicly sited in Cambridge. Commissioned for capital improvements, the art is lasting evidence of the City’s ongoing pursuit to enhance its physical environment. For more information, please visit www.cambridgeartscouncil.org.

Please email inquiries and applications to lhsu@cambridgema.gov with the subject: Attn: Dina Deitsch / Common Internship.