Steve Burges

BA 2013, Classics
PhD candidate in History of Art and Architecture at Boston University

Since graduating Carolina with a degree in Classics, I have pursued a profession in museum curatorship.  I have had the opportunity to work for institutions such as the Brooklyn Museum, the Cooper-Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, where I have held both research and audience engagement positions.  I currently serve as a research fellow, but it’s my goal to work as a curator in the future.

My study of Classics at Carolina has been instrumental to my career in museums because it provided such a unique perspective into the history of our own society.  Reading Terence’s complete Adelphoe in Latin or debating the reconstruction of the paintings of Polygnotos based on surviving Greek pottery were interesting and challenging endeavors I remember from my classes, but they are still relevant because of what they helped me understand about creatively communicating a message and interpreting history from the objects that survive.  Classics is a field focused not only on the ancient world but also on how later civilizations have engaged and reinvented this world.  This makes it particularly pertinent at museums where the past is made relevant for our present society.  Knowing about the Graeco-Roman world will certainly set you apart from the other job applicants; after all, the ancient Athenians established some of the first public art galleries in the west.

August 2016