About

I recently completed my Ph.D. at the University of Leicester’s School of Museum Studies, where I researched how online expert communities align with museums’ curatorial subject matter. The research examines how museums recognize, acknowledge, and participate in these online communities, and how both museums and community members navigate and negotiate exchanges of control and knowledge while recognizing that their interactions have very different motivations. I describe this work in more detail on my research page.

Most recently, I am working in research and evaluation for the art and cultural heritage sector. Currently, I am leading an evaluation of Socrates Sculpture Park’s Artist Fellowships (New York). As an associate at Frankly, Green + Webb, I did analysis for a large evaluation for the UK’s National Heritage Lottery Fund. I also write historical and interpretive content for commercial clients (‘white labeled’) and until recently, was an editor of the peer-reviewed research journal Museological Review

Previously, I was the Project Manager for the Digital Department of the American Museum of Natural History, where she conducted design research and user testing, wrote strategy documents and reports, and coordinated the legal paperwork and financials for the department.  Prior, I was the Digital Interpretive Specialist at The New York Botanical Garden as part of a National Endowment of the Humanities grant, where I developed digital content for exhibitions featuring art historical, cultural, and botanical topics.  I also worked in marketing at both leading mobile interpretation companies (Acoustiguide and Antenna), held consulting positions at The Jewish Museum, The Newark Museum, MuseumHack, and had internships at The Museum of Modern Art, The Whitney Museum of American Art, and The Rubin Museum of Himalayan Art.

My writing about museums has appeared in scholarly publications including the peer-reviewed journals Collections and Museum Worlds and my writing about digital culture has appeared in industry and popular publications including the Center for the Future of Museums, The New York Times, and Tablet Magazine. I have been interviewed by Inverse and the BBC World Service’s Cultural Frontline about digital trends in cultural spaces. My research and web projects have been referenced in Hyperallergic, DMLCentral, Rue89, KillScreen and even The Sun.

My interest in online communities extends to my time creating and moderating the “MuseumPros” community on Reddit.  There, I moderate discussions among the 17,000 subscribers, organize “Ask-Me-Anything” sessions with well-known museum staff, write wiki resource pages, and coordinate an annual, global holiday museum gift shop exchange.

I earned my M.A. in Visual Arts Administration from New York University and my B.F.A. with a double major in illustration and art history from the Rochester Institute of Technology.

Interested in working with me? Resume/CV available upon request!