Although Tiffany Wixom originally came to BYU as a student, she has stayed on campus to fulfill her dream position at BYU’s Museum of Art.
As a freshman, Tiffany Wixom (Art History and Curatorial Studies ’13, Comparative Studies MA ’18) didn’t know what to study, but then she discovered art history and fell in love with it. That passion, and the applicable skills she learned in her humanities education, allowed her to build a career that eventually brought her back to BYU—this time, as a full-time employee.
An Educational Journey
As an undergraduate, Wixom quickly found her place at BYU as an intern at the Museum of Art (MOA) working in registration, where she assisted with cataloguing the museum’s works of art. Her work at the MOA gave her the skills and experience she needed to land a conservation role at the Utah Museum of Fine Arts (UMFA) in Salt Lake City after she graduated. Eventually, she shifted to work as an objects preparer and art handler at the UMFA, which required her to work closely with the museum’s collections manager. This change reminded Wixom that she truly enjoyed registration work, inspiring her to go back to school to become a collections manager herself.
In 2016, she returned to BYU to obtain a master’s degree in comparative studies, a broader discipline that encompasses art history, classical studies, and interdisciplinary humanities, among other things. The change, she says, “was really nice because I was able to customize the program to my needs.” She took classes in art history, anthropology, archeology, and museum studies, all preparing her for the career path she had her sights set on. The professors, she says, “were so helpful in figuring out how to use this comparative arts and letters degree to benefit what I wanted to do.” And while she doesn’t have to write research papers or complete assignments anymore, she appreciates her classes for teaching her “how to research, find primary sources, and expand my original perspective on a topic.” She says, “My classes taught me to look deeper and ask questions. All these skills I use every day.”
While working towards her master’s degree, Wixom returned to work at the MOA in the registration department—work that continued after she graduated. When her boss, the collections manager, retired a few years later, Wixom applied and got the job, which she has now held for seven years.
A Glimpse into the Job
Wixom juggles a multitude of responsibilities as the collections manager at the MOA. Her main job is to keep careful track of over 18,700 objects in the museum. All objects are logged in the museum’s database system, which Wixom ensures stays up to date. She and her team of student employees periodically conduct a full inventory of theworks in the museum, which takes two to three years to complete. Every object has both a digital file and a physical file, both of which are updated in this inventory process.
While Wixom is not in charge of choosing the new pieces acquired by the museum, she is in charge of the paperwork, which includes giving each object a number and a location and photographing them for their file in the system. She is also responsible for preparing objects for exhibition, which could mean anything from cutting mats for the pieces, framing them, sending them for conservation work, or finding ways for visiting pieces to acclimate to the dry climate of Utah.
Wixom, alongside many departments in the museum, also works behind the scenes to bring the exhibits to life. Creating exhibitions, she says, is “like a big team project—we have lots of moving parts.” Wixom uses the database to keep track of which exhibition each piece was involved in, how long each piece has been on display, and how long each piece has been exposed to light. Each piece can be exposed to light for only a certain amount of time, depending on its material and age. Wixom works closely with exhibit curators to ensure that the pieces they select can be shown for the length of the exhibit, and she even suggests works that haven’t been shown before, because they can handle more exposure.
“The best part of my job is that every day is pretty much different. Because you’re working on something different all the time, and new exhibitions every year, it doesn’t get boring,” she says.
A Continual Journey
Wixom appreciates the opportunities that her degrees provided. “People would say, ‘What are you going to do with an art history degree?’” she says. “And honestly there are so many different opportunities and unique jobs. You just have to think outside the box.”
Receiving a humanities education, Wixom says, helped her to “look at the world in new ways and see how important art, history, and culture are.” She now uses that ability to expand her perspective, to look deeper, and to ask questions every single day in her job. Wixom says, “There is so much world to see and explore, and the humanitiesopened my eyes to that.”
Learn about the MOA’s exhibits and visiting hours at moa.byu.edu, and visit their Internships & Fellowships page to learn about how students can get involved at the MOA!