Author: Shelby Kim
Earlier this summer, I attended my first field school. I spent a month digging in the dirt at Lechaion Harbor in Corinth. Every day, we excavated hundreds of items, including tile, pottery, bones, shells, glass, and more. We picked away at the cemented soil, brushing carefully when we encountered an item. And at the end of each day, we brought our finds back to base and added them to the registrar’s pile.
Upon returning to Pittsburgh, I found myself on the other side of things. At the Annex, one of the offsite storage facilities of the Carnegie Museum of Natural History (CMNH), I was tasked with sorting and cataloging a Pennsylvania archaeological collection for safe, organized storage. I individually labeled and bagged each item based on how they were organized in our database, as well as item type. Suddenly, I was the one on the receiving end of hundreds of bones, and I reveled in the monotony.
There was something so lovely about being able to take an archaeological journey full circle, to ensure that these objects would be easily accessible to future students and researchers. As a hopeful conservator, the preservation of objects is something I’m passionate about. This fellowship gave me opportunities to create archival safe storage materials, as well as to work with the conservation team at the museum. I was able to observe the work being done on the Egyptian collection and take on a preventative care project of my own. Again, there’s a contrast to the field school, where conservation activity was more fast-paced and provisional. The museum conservation work is seemingly endless, but there is still a capability to prioritize and focus on certain projects that the relative chaos of a dig does not allow.
Despite the conservation lab being on display, and the voices of museum visitors present amid its work, the environment inside the lab is peaceful and focused. This summer project showed me that museum work is endless, that there is always something to be done, and that not all of it is glamorous. There are a lot of quiet tasks, and there’s always new opportunities and wonderful people to meet and work with. Amy Covell-Murthy and Kristina Gaugler fostered a welcoming environment, encouraging students to orient their contributions according to their interests. Outside of my main project at the Annex, I was able to be part of lunchtime meetings, to assist a class at the Carnegie Museum's summer camp, and learn aspects of fiber arts alongside other staff and volunteers. This fellowship has only motivated me further to enter the field of museum conservation. It’s hard to know whether you’ll like the day to day of any job until you try it, and I can say I know now this is the right pathway for me.
Shelby Kim was a 2024 Summer Fellow at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History, generously supported by Jay Miller.