JiveSync

Name: Kerry Rose, 29
Position: Curatorial assistant at the National Gallery of Art
Salary: GS-9 federal pay: $53,435-$69,460

What she does
Kerry Rose spends her days tending to the artwork of the masters — Pablo Picasso, Alexander Calder and Jackson Pollock, to name a few — on display at the National Gallery of Art, where she is a curatorial assistant for the permanent collection of modern art.

Rose is part of the team that guides a piece of art through its entire life at the gallery. She assists in a painting or sculpture’s acquisition; works with the registrar’s office to make sure it arrives and is installed safely; assists with creating the label that will identify the artwork in the gallery and on its website; and helps coordinate when it’s time to loan the piece to another institution. The department of modern art oversees more than 2,500 works of art.

Advertisement

Additionally, Rose coordinates with photographers; writes exhibition catalog entries on the NGA’s works; researches the provenance, or history of ownership, of pieces in the collection; and makes research files on new art objects and artists. Occasionally, she leads gallery talks for exhibitions or specific works of art in the permanent collection.

One of Rose’s favorite parts of the job is getting up close and personal with “Multiverse,” the 200-foot-long light installation that visitors pass through between the east and west buildings of the gallery. Rose works with the art handlers and conservators on the day-to-day maintenance of the approximately 41,000 computer-programmed LED nodes that run through channels along the walkway.

“Sometimes, when you go into a museum, you don’t think about who takes care of these things,” she says.

Advertisement

How she got the job
Although she came from a family of artists, Rose decided to go against the grain while in college by majoring in math. “I wanted to do something practical” she says.

While a freshman at Johns Hopkins University, Rose took a modern art class as an elective, and realized that was what she was meant to do.

“Cubism was my thing instead of calculus,” says Rose, who ended up receiving a bachelor’s degree in art history in 2008, with a minor in Italian literature.

She went on to earn a master’s degree in art history in 2010 from Tufts University in Boston, where she focused on modern art, and to hold internships at the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Baltimore Museum of Art, and a fellowship at the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore.

Rose and her husband, Chris Dorbian, 30, moved to D.C. in 2010, before they were married, when Chris — now an aeronautical engineer at the Federal Aviation Administration — landed a job with the Mitre Corporation.

Advertisement

Rose was applying to jobs related to art history when she came across her current position on usajobs.gov — a free site for federal job seekers — and applied. “I was lucky,” she says, because navigating the federal job application process can be tricky, and art history is a small field. Rose has been working with the National Gallery of Art since January 2011.

Who would want this job?
Are you one of those people who could spend hours in an art museum? Good, because that kind of one-on-one time with each piece is crucial for Rose to confidently explain the works when she leads tours of the gallery.
It also helps if you value making art accessible to the public, especially for a job at the National Gallery of Art, which is funded by a federal endowment established by financier and art collector Andrew W. Mellon, and is free to the public.

Being “super organized” and computer literate are both a plus, as Rose’s job involves navigating databases and using imaging software in the Adobe suite.

Advertisement

“It’s a large institution, so a collaborative spirit and a ‘can-do’ attitude can go a long way,” she says.

How you can get this job
A strong background in art history is a must, Rose says, and employers will usually be looking for candidates with graduate degrees. Locally, American University, George Washington University, Johns Hopkins University, the University of Maryland and George Mason University offer graduate programs in art history, while Georgetown University offers a master’s in museum studies.

Rose recommends finding professors whose areas of expertise match your own research interests. The best thing an aspiring curatorial assistant can do, though, is to gain experience through internships and fellowships at museums and galleries. “The more experience, the better,” Rose says. But take note: The internships and fellowships will be unpaid.

Advertisement

“I’m really happy there,” Rose says of her job, noting that it is an “exciting time” for the department of modern art since the east building, which houses most of the modern art for the permanent collection, has been undergoing a renovation since 2013, and is expected to fully reopen this fall.

Other jobs you may want to steal:

Steal this job: English language coach

Steal this job: Barbecue pitmaster

Steal this job: Craft coffee roaster

ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7uK3SoaCnn6Sku7G70q1lnKedZLK5vNGeqqxnp6V8c3yQb2ZpbV9mfXC%2F056YpWWknba0ecmomWabpaeutbvRopilZZGowKq%2F05qlrWWRqXq1tMRmpZqsmaS7oriMoJilpJWnxm67xWaYq6xf