Rice Thresher
By Michelle Gachelin
Kenzie Pickett accomplishes the impossible — she revives centuries-old artifacts for the modern world. As a Camfield fellow at the Museum of Fine Arts, she spends 10 to 15 hours each week researching historical objects, preparing for the museum’s new traveling exhibit and writing tombstones, which are 100-word labels that describe each artwork. At Rice, Pickett is double majoring in art history and ancient Mediterranean civilizations and double minoring in museum studies and cultural heritage. Her interest in curatorial work and museums was first ignited as a child, when she watched “Jurassic Park” and “Night at the Museum,” in which characters are magically resuscitated, reentering the 21st century as new beings.
“What these movies captured was the imagination of what a museum could be,” Pickett, a Brown College senior, said. “You have these static objects, and the first impression is that they’re dead, in the sense that they’re inanimate and there’s nothing interesting going on. But there’s this magic in the movie — in a literal sense, magic that’s bringing everything to life. You’re able to actually have conversations with these pieces and experience the culture and the history firsthand.”