Opportunities

Getty Marrow Curatorial Internship - Summer 2025

The Wende Museum offers a Getty Marrow Undergraduate curatorial internship for Summer 2025. This is a consecutive ten-week full-time work period between June and August 2025. Working closely with the Wende Museum’s Chief Curator and Director of Programming and Associate Curator, the curatorial intern will be trained in the various steps involved in exhibition development from initial exhibition concept to implementation.

The curatorial intern will perform exhibition research, draft exhibition texts, format object labels, prepare education guides, participate in conversation in weekly Curatorial meetings, learn and utilize Collection databases Mimsy and Piction, log object information into excel sheets, format Loan Agreements, and upload exhibition images and text to the museum’s Bloomberg Connects app.

This year, the curatorial intern will support the Chief Curator and Associate Curator with Fall 2025 exhibitions Enrique Martínez Celaya: The Sextant, a custom art installation reflecting on the contemporary artist’s childhood home in communist Cuba, and Intersections: The Architecture of Victor Adegbite and Charles Polónyi, an exhibition about architectural and urban exchange program between two architects from Hungary and Ghana. The curatorial intern will also work on our Fall 2026 exhibition, Competing Cosmologies: Interpreting the Sky, which will delve into the competing artistic interpretations of scientific discoveries in astrophysics and astronomy during the Cold War period and beyond. Candidates with an interest in experimental curatorial practices, cultural and political history, and art historical research are encouraged to apply.

Characteristics we look for:

• Idea-generative, creative, focused, and detailed-oriented individuals
• Enthusiasm in performing tasks well
• Experience in Adobe Creative Suites is a plus (not required)
• Exceptional writing and research abilities

Getty Marrow Eligibility Criteria:

• Be a member of groups underrepresented in professions related to museums and the visual
  arts, including, but not limited to, individuals of African American, Asian, Latino/Hispanic,
  Native American, and Pacific Islander descent.
• Be a currently enrolled undergraduate and have completed at least one semester of college
  by June 2025
•  Be a resident of or attend college in Los Angeles County.

Applications will be accepted until 5pm on Friday, April 18, 2025. To apply, please send a cover letter outlining your interest and a current resume to jsegal@wendemuseum.org and ediffley@wendemuseum.org with Getty Marrow Curatorial Internship in the email subject line.

Collections Internship

“Wende” is a German word that means “transformation.” It is commonly used to describe the era of uncertainty and possibility leading up to and following the fall of the Berlin Wall. Headquartered in a renovated National Guard Armory in Culver City, the Wende Museum is a cultural laboratory that pairs unparalleled collections from the Cold War era with contemporary artists, filmmakers, musicians, scholars, and others. The Wende’s collection encompasses more than 100,000 holdings, ranging from consumer products to fine art, political symbols, audiovisual materials, spy equipment, posters, ephemera, commemoratives, books, archives, and personal histories.

The Wende Museum offers Collections Internships for currently enrolled undergraduate or graduate students, as well as recent graduates who are interested in gaining experience in collection management, collection development, and artifact research. Positions are part-time, paid at $18/hour for 120 hours, and available for course credit. Internships are offered year-round, typically beginning in January, June, and September.

The Collections Internship will focus on cataloging the Museum’s incoming acquisitions and existing backlog. Interns will gain experience in key areas of object handling, processing objects, and using a museum database (Mimsy XG). Interns will have the opportunity to directly work with artifacts from the Cold War and be exposed to a variety of museum activities. Potential interns must meet the following criteria for consideration:

• Be available to work part-time between Monday and Friday;
• Have completed at least one semester of college by the time of application;
• Possess an interest in museum studies, collections management, history, and/or material and visual culture of the Cold War;
• Be comfortable working with databases and computers;
• Be detail-oriented, self-motivated, and independent, with excellent communication skills;
• A reading knowledge of German, Russian, or an Eastern European Language is helpful but not required.

We are currently accepting applications for our Summer internship, which is set to begin in June 2025, through May 2. To apply, please fill out this form and send a cover letter outlining your interest and a current resume to internships@wendemuseum.org.

Please indicate that you are applying for the Collections Internship, both in the email subject and cover letter.