INTERNSHIP STORIES

Design Internship for a Magazine I found out about this internship opportunity on LinkedIn - the person hiring was a former alumni and adjunct professor who reposted the listing on my feed. I had applied at the beginning of the summer. I got an email back from their HR manager and set up a virtual interview where they gauged my personality and work ethic. I passed the first round and was given a second interview with the design team where I got to talk more about my design process and time management skills, which seemed to resonate with the team. I was given another a week later!  AARP is an interest group in the United States focusing on issues affecting those 50 years old and older. Their magazine has the most readers than any other publication in the country, with over 30 million readers as of 2023. Their magazine focuses on everything from lifestyle stories to health reads and political responses. My direct supervisor is the Associate Art Director at AARP who mainly focuses on...

Design and Marketing Internship for an Independent Bookstore Wonderland Books is an independent Bookstore and community space in Bethesda, Maryland which will be opening in early December. I had the opportunity to work together with the Wonderland Books team this semester to help them prepare for opening – learning about how an independent bookstore comes together and how to work to solidify and market a new brand in the process.  I discovered this opportunity through mutual contacts — one of the two  co-owners of Wonderland Books is a family friend who reached out looking for a bit of help with some of the design work over the summer, and from there I was able to start working with them and their brand designer, who had already created a strong brand identity for the bookstore. I was able to use those brand identity guidelines to help create a wide variety of both print and digital design material for use in-store and online. Throughout this internship, I was able to create a...

Over the past few months I was keeping a personal log of all the available internship and job opportunities within my area of interest. However, none of the internships I found caught my eye. I took inspiration from my friends who were applying for more extravagant internships to finally start applying to places. Through my search my love for printmaking had resurfaced and I stumbled upon Flatbed's internship. I applied through their website and had a brief interview with the head of lithography printing/education supervisor. Flatbed Press is a community and professional print shop with a gallery component. The press was started and is currently run by an intaglio printmaker. The owner and my supervisor work as the shop's professional collaborative printers working in monotype, relief, intaglio, and lithography. Flatbed also hosts regular workshops and classes taught by local printmakers and artists I reported to both the owner and my supervisor although I believe I was technic...

The Washington Printmakers Gallery is an artist-run gallery founded in 1985 that houses contemporary fine art prints and photographs. It now has a membership of local and national printmakers, photographers, and book artists. They host juried shows, both group and solo exhibitions, workshops, classes, talks, and outreach programs. The gallery also houses bins and flat files with artist’s prints and photographs. When I first heard about the Washington Printmakers Gallery, it was through my dad who was interested in visiting the gallery with me over summer break. When researching on their website, I noticed that they offered internship opportunities for academic credit. I decided to reach out and after a few exchanges, we discovered that my advisor and a professor were members of the gallery for many years. With this connection, I managed to secure an interview as well as the request of my art in person. I arrived with my art and was accepted as an intern almost immediately. We decided t...

I was following shoestring press on social media, they specialized in social activism which really stuck out to me. I emailed them early in December to lock down a summer internship. Shoestring Press is a community print studio in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. They work as a shop for experienced and new artists, providing space for 40+ printmakers and creatives to engage with both each other and their own work. It creates a space to do the rather technical sides of printmaking that require specific equipment, all at a relatively low cost and with quite a bit included. The team handles a lot of the prep for printing for members, mostly in regards to screen printing, trying to make it as accessible as possible for members. The press also has a master printing and commercial printing side, doing official work for larger artists and taking spare print jobs on their large LaserJet printer for banners and posters. My direct supervisor while I was on the job was the master printer and owner at Sho...

I was made aware of the opportunity via my professor, who directed me to somebody who was willing to provide an internship opportunity involving the freelance comic industry. After a few email exchanges, I went inside the studio and had a brief chat. It took about one semester after, before I was able to actually get the internship, when I showed him a mini comic I completed. My supervisor is a freelance pre-press technician, who formats comics, books, posters which aren’t print ready. He cleans up formatting issues, or lettering issues and adjusts space in between. During my internship, I had other small jobs, but mainly to scan various files in his inventory, which he plans to use for an archival project. Later, I was assigned to be a flatter for a middle grade DC graphic novel at a base pay rate, which I’m most proud of.  I learned many things such as the inner workings of freelancers in the industry, a new perspective on the lives of such people, their financial experiences, th...

My journey with AARP began when I was actively searching for internships in publication design. I discovered the opportunity through a faculty member who taught designing for a diverse and mature audience. I secured the internship after a competitive application process, which included a phone call and an interview that tested my design sensibilities and understanding of AARP's audience. My primary responsibilities included working on layouts for the upcoming issues of AARP's magazine, creating branding assets, assisting in preparing presentations, and providing support for social media campaigns. I was deeply involved in the conceptualization to final production stages of several key layouts, which taught me the intricacies of publication design in a real-world setting. I am most proud of a layout design I created for a feature article in the magazine. I’m eager to see the response of the readers. The most important thing I learned was the significance of empathetic design – c...

I found this internship from a Google search. I just uploaded my resume and my personal website. I don’t really remember how much time passed, and then I got an email that said they were interested in working with me. For the process, they sent me something that acted as a test that required me to finish a piece of work, almost like an audition. Then, after my work was reviewed, they would send an email back to tell me if they wanted to hire me. After that, they sent me the offer.  They are a non-profit publisher organization. They don’t really have a lot of people, the only two people I knew were our direct supervisor, and another one being the Editor-in-Chief. My direct supervisor would give us work that we needed to complete in time before the deadline. She would also give you help if you were to have any problems as well as suggestions sometimes.  My position was as an illustrator intern. I needed to finish the illustration for their specific work. The work would be an ill...

I found out about this opportunity through an info session and through one of my professors at MICA. I sent in my resume and cover letter through their application form and a couple weeks later I was contacted by them for an interview, where we discussed the required roles and responsibilities of the intern in more detail, as well as confirming eligibility requirements and scheduling. About a week later I got an email confirming that they would like to hire me and my schedule. The Highlights Foundation is an organization under the Highlights children’s magazine, which runs a retreat and workshop center in Boyds Mills, PA. At this center and virtually, they organize workshops, talks, and retreats for both newcomers and professionals in the field of children’s literature, particularly writers and illustrators. There was another intern along with myself and our major responsibility was to oversee the day to day running of the workshops on campus. As part of this, we would assist guests wi...

After connecting with a fellow GDMFA colleague at MICA, he offered me an internship opportunity at Washingtonian Magazine. Publication and Editorial design were something I was interested in, so I decided to pursue this internship Washingtonian Magazine publishes monthly magazines highlighting information and events about and in D.C. My GDMFA colleague was my supervisor and is also the Creative Director at Washingtonian Magazine. As an art fellow/intern, I would report to him during our morning and end-of-day meetings, and he would give me feedback and critique the assignments and current projects. My responsibilities were to assist with design projects by creating and preparing mood boards, collecting swipes or images for research, researching typefaces, illustrations, and logo designs, and designing iterations and series of spread designs about the topics. I also had the opportunity to create spot illustrations for a project.  I am proud that I learned something new every day at ...

Last fall the founder of Saint Lucy Books was invited to MICA to talk about his recently published book. In the spring when I was trying to find an appropriate internship site, I was urged to reach out to the founder about possibly assisting him with some work. I was incredibly excited about the idea of working with a small Baltimore-based publishing company, especially as Saint Lucy’s focus is on female artists and the collaboration of text and images. The founder Saint Lucy was my supervisor and I joined him in May to help with current and future titles and the brand identity of Saint Lucy. We attended ICP’s photobook fest where we were one of over 50 independent photobook publishers. Once back from NYC, my supervisor and I started working with a past faculty member at MICA on her upcoming book. During this, I helped with image selection, essay editing, and even some of the early ideas pertaining to the physicality of the book. In early June I began working heavily with my superviso...

This summer, I had the privilege of interning at the Small Editions Bindery (SE) in Brooklyn, a shop that, as stated by their website, “ offers services in book and print design, bookbinding, fine printing, and box making,” as well as publishing. To secure this internship, I emailed SE and after a brief email exchange and a more extensive phone interview, they agreed to take me on for the summer. During my time in this internship, I was given a wide range of tasks. I worked on every aspect of assembly throughout my internship; cutting bookboard, gluing boards down to the case material, assembling pockets & straps for the books, assembling the cases themselves, as well as the cleaning/packing process for this hefty undertaking.  Looking back on this internship, the thing that I am most proud of is the personal project that I took on to restore a very important book for my mother. My supervisor made it clear that she wanted me to have a personal project to be able to walk away f...

AARP is an interest group in the United States that focuses on issues affecting those over the age of fifty. I worked within the ICM (Integrated Communication and Marketing) Department. A professor of mine shared the link to the Publication Design Intern position and along with the application, he connected me to another professor who actually works at the company as a designer who I was able to reach out to with my materials and exchange a few emails. For the most part I worked with the Associate Art Director. Though she was more of my day-to-day supervisor, I worked with several people on different projects. I worked with the Assistant Art Director with The Ethel Newsletter’s social media posts. I was also specifically tasked with designing the International Women’s History Month campaign. There is another newsletter by AARP called the Veteren’s Report for which I was asked to design bi-weekly covers of the stories featured. Additionally, I was trained in the software used by the com...

It all started when I was watching several films on a raining day. These films ranged from  documentary to scripted narratives. As I would scroll down at the end of the film to see the  credits, I would notice one similar logo. The logo was “ Tribeca Film Institute ”, or “Tribeca Film  Festival”. My interest grew as I started to research them. I was fascinated by their goals and  philosophy of finding independent filmmakers and producing their work so that larger audiences  can see the films.  A couple of months went by and I was still searching for an internship. Until one day I  was talking to my brothers friend who is a filmmaker himself, and I told him my interest in TFI.  He smiled and said that he worked with the head director of TFI on a film. Her name is Amy  Hobby. He gave me her contact information and I drafted a email to her. She was happy to see  my interest so she connected me to Olivia Creamer who is in charg...

I found out about this internship opportunity in a few different ways. I heard about the  opportunity originally while using the lab at Light Work the summer before, but I heard about it  again while talking to Nate Larson about internships during the spring semester. After I was  reminded about the internship I filled out the online application, and wrote an essay along with  attaching my resume. Light Work is a non profit that was created by to be artist run, in 1973.  Light work has residencies, publications, exhibitions, a community access lab, and many other  projects to help artists working in photography and digital imaging. Light Work is located in  Syracuse,NY, on the Syracuse University campus. Light Work also works with the local Everson  Museum to complete the Urban Video Project , where artists films are projected onto the side of  the museum.  My direct supervisor was John Manion, his role within the orga...

My name is Ethan Wong and I am a sophomore Graphic Design major. During the summer of 2018, I was a print intern for The CW Television Network , an American English-language broadcast television network based in Burbank, California. Working in the entertainment industry had always interested me because I was heavily invested in many of the TV shows that The CW had to offer, and I felt that I could learn a lot about how TV networks create their posters and advertisements. I found out about this opportunity through a reference from a family member, after which I met with the Executive Creative Director, Rick Frey. After a brief interview, I showed him my resume and portfolio. He was kind enough to offer me a position over the summer where I would be working with art directors, retouchers, and publishers. For the most part, I worked with Elizabeth O’Brien, a Senior Brand Manager in charge of managing assets for the Print department. I was involved in many proje...