The National Museum for African American History and Culture’s Mellon Curatorial Fellowship is a unique opportunity for young scholars to learn from expert curators while developing their own curatorial skills. As a former fellow and current curatorial assistant, Dr. Loren Miller found that transitioning from an academic to a museum setting presented distinctive trials that challenged some of her academic training. This paper will explore the challenges, successes, and growth she has experienced during her tenure at the Museum.
During her fellowship and in her current role, Miller has worked with the head of the Museum’s Earl W. and Amanda Stafford Center for African American Media Arts (CAAMA), Dr. Rhea Combs, who is also the curator of photography and film. Miller contributed to the research, development, and writing of CAAMA’s inaugural exhibition Everyday Beauty. The exhibition highlights common themes in African American lives through photography, such as self-presentation, courtship and family, education and uplift, faith and activism, and work and play. Throughout her work on the exhibit Miller applied her academic training and historical knowledge to develop themes, select and research photographs, and write text for general audiences. However, coming from academia, this work presented questions that Miller was forced to confront—How do you perform research on images when traditional primary sources are not typically available? How do you make an argument using photography as your sole source of evidence? How do you translate in-depth research so that it engages broad general audiences?
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