My final three semesters as a student at Emory University and the months following have been defined by the Carlos Museum. In Fall 2022, I began my journey here as a Student Guide for the Greek and Roman gemstones exhibit Making an Impression: The Art and Craft of Ancient Engraved Gemstones. These periods intrigue me the most as an art historian, so it was a no-brainer for me to want to enhance and share my knowledge about these objects as a tour guide. I thought that it was truly fascinating to see the amount of history that could be told just from gemstones, from the trade routes established to mine for them to the stories carved into them.
The semester after was probably my favorite and busiest semester at the Carlos Museum. I worked as both a tour guide and an intern within the education department. That semester, the rotating exhibition was Life and Afterlife: Ancient Egyptian Art from the Senusret Collection, an exhibition that focused on these concepts within ancient Egypt. For my tours, I focused on the lives of the objects and what determines whether a conserved or replaced piece is considered true, similar to the ship of Theseus paradox. Within the education department, I did a bit of everything. I helped with children’s activities on the weekends, worked on the stats for events and tours, and assisted in bringing the Spring 2023 Student Night to life. My supervisor Alice had the idea to bring music into the galleries and I jumped at the opportunity to bring live music to some of the objects who hadn’t heard any in hundreds, if not thousands of years. At the time I was in a band called Lady Gadget and the Rigamarole (shoutout Gabe, Lucy, and Koan) and we played two 30-minute sets, one acoustic within the galleries and a full band set on the 3rd floor outdoor patio.
In my final semester as an undergraduate, I worked again within the education department. I led more events this time around such as DigIt, on National Archaeology Day and Parents’ Weekend during Homecoming. For DigIt, we had multiple speakers give 15-minute speeches on archaeological topics and others create posters with their data. I gave a speech about some of the work that occurred on the American Excavations at Samothrace, which I participated in during the previous summer. Then, for Parents Weekend, I helped run the Carlos Museum’s booth. The theme was inspired by the temporary exhibition You Belong Here: Place, People, and Purpose in Latinx Photography, an exhibition about a sense of belonging in different contexts. For our booth we had families write out what makes them feel a sense of belonging and then took their photos on the quad.
Once I graduated, I came back to Carlos Museum to work in the conservation lab with Renée Stein and her team as an intern. I’ve always been interested in the upkeep and science behind art just as much as the creation of it, so this gave me a chance to see it up close. The variety of work I have done in the lab has been the most rewarding part of this position, anything from assessing loans for damage to dusting the casts and cases within the museum and library; it’s all been great! There is also a ton of administrative work I’ve done by filing samples and updating the database with object information. The breadth of work is refreshing for a single job, and overall, I love the fact that I am able to work for an institution that has given me so much during my time as an undergraduate.
Lonnie Reid graduated from Emory University in fall 2023 with degrees in mathematics and art history. This summer, he is working as a field assistant in Kurdistan, Iraq, with Petra Creamer, assistant professor of the Ancient Near East in the Middle Eastern and South Asian Studies Department at Emory University. He has recently accepted a position as a mathematics teacher at Rabun Gap, starting in August 2024.
