Hannah’s story starts with an amazing art history class she took in high school (hi Ms. Gajendragadkar!) that sparked a curiosity in the stories we tell with art that she carries with her to this day.

Read more below, in Hannah’s words

I grew up around a lot of art and culture but I only fell in love with it when I took AP Art History in high school. I had a great teacher who helped me see that studying art was both a way to study and understand history, as well as ourselves. I became the resident art historian and tour guide on family vacations, eager to share what I had learned in my class.

In college I majored in Classical & Near Eastern Archaeology. I thought for a while I was going to be an archaeologist, in the literal trenches, digging up secrets to the history of the world. After graduating I applied to museum studies Masters programs on a whim and ultimately chose the Museum Education program at Tufts University. It finally made sense to me why I was so drawn to the art history courses I had taken in college but for some reason didn’t excel at—I was missing the personal connection, the humanity behind these objects, the “why” behind the value of understanding material culture. 

After finishing my Masters I went to do an internship at Lincoln Center in New York with their guided tour program. The internship turned into a full time fellowship, which turned into a job, and I ended up staying there for about three years. During that time, I managed the volunteer corps, part time staff, and summer interns, but I missed working with the tour program and helping to shape prolonged educational experiences. I also found that I missed school and that I still had questions about the nature of my work as an art museum educator that I wanted to research. So I went back to school to get my Ed.D. in Art & Art Education at Teachers College, which I finished in June 2021.

My research focuses on manifestations of Whiteness in gallery teaching. Not only did I come out of my Ed.D. with a deep understanding of different qualities of White supremacist culture, but I also developed a research practice that honors all participants involved, and treats my role as researcher critically as well. In my work at Kera Collective, I hope to apply everything I have learned along the way: appreciating the “why,” dismantling oppressive practices in evaluation and research, and meeting each other where we are.