Diary of an NUS Museum Intern: Deborah Lim

Note: Diary of an NUS Museum Intern is a series of blog posts written by our interns about their experiences during the course of their internships. Working alongside their mentors, our interns have waded through tons of historical research, assisted in curatorial work, pitched in during exhibition installations and organised outreach events! If you would like to become our next intern, visit our internship page for more information! 

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Deborah Lim is currently doing a Master of Arts in Museum Studies and Curatorial Practices at the Nanyang Technological University. As a Curatorial Intern, she worked alongside curator Siddharta Perez, researching on art and pedagogy and looking into archival materials from the exhibition “There are too many episodes of people coming here…” to create a speculative curriculum of creative exercises.

This NUS Museum internship experience has been an enriching and generative one. Coming into the internship, I was excited about the possibilities of working within the space of the museum and being able to be a part of its processes. However, working from home has proven to be interesting in other ways – there were many opportunities to learn from others through conversations, engage with the museum’s archives, and deeply reflect on exhibition-making, the institution of the museum, and my own beliefs about art and pedagogy.

My colleague, Poesy, in her cubicle

Alongside our supervisor, Sidd, the curatorial interns embarked on an experimental programme that was inspired by a book titled “How Art Can be Thought” by Allan deSouza. Revolving around the intersecting fields of art and pedagogy, the programme initially seemed as if it was modelled after a module or course – a format that I am used to as a student – but later on took on a more personal and creative form of learning. We began by interrogating some of the assumptions or beliefs that we held about education and art. Then diving into a set of primary readings, we shared provocations and speculations, and went on to look into other interesting strands and ideas. 

Through these discussions, we explored alternatives to formal or mainstream education, questioned the “curatorial turn” and its possibilities, examined the ways artists and curators resist colonial histories and navigate present sociocultural contexts through independent, parasitic or parainstitutional (and many other) pedagogical efforts, and considered how art institutions can be at the forefront of public education and change. 

The culmination of these discussions took shape in a group project, a think tank on Instagram which documents our reading sessions and continuing group conversations (follow us on @a_bibliography_artandeducation!), as well as an individual project, in which I looked into the archival material from the exhibition “There are too many episodes of people coming here…” to create a speculative curriculum of creative exercises. 

I have learnt so much from this experience at NUS Museum. Thank you to everyone who has been so generous with their time to share about their work at the museum, and especially Sidd, Anh and Marcus for inspiring me!