2026-2027 Academic Year YCBA Bartels Internship: Prints & Drawings

Application Deadline: May 1, 2026 at 11:59pm

Department Description:

The Department of Prints and Drawings oversees the YCBA’s collection of some sixty thousand prints, drawings, and photographs. The Curator/Department Head and Assistant Curator work closely with department colleagues, fellows, and interns to research, catalogue, and publish the collection; organize exhibitions; propose acquisitions of works of art through purchase and gift; and facilitate communication with colleagues at Yale, scholars, researchers, and the public in order to share the collection with the YCBA’s many visitors online and in person. Upcoming shows featuring work from the Prints and Drawings collection include an exhibition on landscape photography and on the modernist painter Gwen John. We work closely with YCBA colleagues in all departments, including the other curatorial departments, the Study Room for works on paper collections, Paper Conservation, Imaging, and Installations, among others. 

Position Description: 

The intern will work closely and collaboratively on the preparation of two exhibitions: one on the history of mezzotint engraving scheduled for the fall of 2027, and the other focusing on the nineteenth-century Trinidadian artist Michel Jean Cazabon (date TBD). 

Mezzotint, a tonal printmaking technique ideally suited to the replication of painted tone, became closely associated with eighteenth-century British painting despite its international origins and use. Working closely with the Curator, the intern will provide vital research assistance in developing the exhibition checklist and layout and conducting research for in-gallery texts. The YCBA holds the drawings for Cazabon’s lithographs depicting the island of Trinidad in the nineteenth century. The intern will contribute to research that will contextualize these drawings, researching related artists and landscape, to develop a checklist of related materials across Yale, focused on artistic and historical links. 

Both projects offer a chance to learn how to conduct original research in service of two exhibitions and their related publications, navigate institutional collections, and gain broader exposure to the day-to-day workings of a curatorial department.