INTERNSHIP STORIES

My name is Allie Linn and I am a junior Interdisciplinary Sculpture major at MICA with an Art History minor and a Sustainability and Social Practices concentration. During the summer of 2012, I interned at Whitelock Community Farm, a local urban farm in Reservoir Hill, to further my knowledge of urban agriculture. I began working at Whitelock Community Farm this past semester through Hugh Pocock’s Baltimore Urban Farming class, and I found myself instantly drawn to doing manual labor while also engaging in the community in the pursuit to provide the neighborhood with access to locally grown and affordable produce. In some ways, I see it as completely separate from my artistic pursuits, but in other ways, I believe the two go hand in hand. The farm and its mission make up an entire, long-term design project that represents the type of work I want to be making, and I saw continuing to work at Whitelock as an opportunity to fur...

One of my closest friends from home, Jonah, interned at Social Impact Studios (formerly known as Design for Social Impact) in Philadelphia for two summers in a row. He always seemed to have a good experience with the organization, and I was interested in the work that they do.  Jonah put in a good word for me, and I sent Ennis, the founder and director of the studio, my resume, cover letter, and work samples. Soon enough, I became their newest Summer intern. Social Impact Studios’ slogan is “We Communicate Good.” Thus, they use Graphic Design and clear, meaningful language to create identities and other materials for non-profit and for-profit organizations. Ennis and James were both my supervisors. I primarily worked with James, the creative director until he left at the end of July. I was responsible for editing drafts of design work, creating different formats of what was already created, for example turning a brochure into a ...

My name is Alena Jaffe and I am now a senior Graphic Design major with concentrations in Printmaking and Book Arts. This past summer I was the one intern in the Off-Air Graphics Department at Comedy Central (Viacom). To get this internship I applied online at Viacom and submitted my resume, portfolio, and answered a series of questions. A woman in the College Relations department at Viacom got me in touch with Angelina Battista, the Brand Creative Director for Comedy Central, who then contacted me. I then had a phone interview with Angelina and was hired over the phone! At Comedy Central I worked in the Off-Air Graphics department, which is the department that works on all of the print based media for Comedy Central. This includes: subway ads, billboards, website banners, invitations, logos, and promotional materials. My roles in the department involved attending meetings, brainstorm sessions, and helping design anything from lo...

This summer I interned at Boom! Studios in Los Angeles. I found out about the internship online – one of the editors at Boom, Shannon Watters, follows my Tumblr blog and when I posted that I was looking for an internship, she reached out to me and let me know about their internship program. We emailed back and forth for a while, then I submitted my resume and did a phone interview with the rest of the company and was offered the position a few days later. Boom! Studios is a top-ten comics publishing company – they publish everything from superhero comics to indie titles to all-ages comics, including one of their current headliners, the Adventure Time comics.  It is a fairly small company, and the atmosphere is very laid back. Shannon was my direct supervisor, and really took me under her wing. As an editor and an industry insider, she gave me a lot of advice and introduced me to a lot of comic professionals, as well as ...

For the duration of the summer I interned at Pyramid Atlantic Art Center, located in Silver Spring, Maryland. Upon the recommendation of my professors, I applied to Pyramid Atlantic. It is run by Gretchen Schermerhorn, the artistic director, and Jose Dominguez, the executive director. They run a successful community printshop with a relaxed atmosphere. Pyramid’s core is made up of local artists who volunteer at Pyramid and in return are given free studio time. Pyramid also works with clientele in the community and sponsors community events to better the understanding of art.  There were 7 studio interns including myself. As a studio intern we worked two days a week, and at least 7 hours outside of that towards our own artwork. I was at pyramid usually 4 or 5 days a week. In return we were granted free studio time and 3 credits. Our work involved cleaning up the studios as well as larger projects. The summer inte...