Announcing the 2025 Museum Fellows Term Cohort
Nine Bennington College students–the largest cohort to date–have been selected as Frankenthaler Fellows for the 2025 Museum Fellows Term, a study-away program that provides participants with practical, professional art world internship experience working at a major cultural institution in New York City for five months.
First launched in January 2015 with a pilot grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, Bennington College now runs Museum Fellows Term in partnership with the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation. The program spans both Field Work Term and Spring terms each year and provides students with an intensive, immersive experience that is rarely available at the undergraduate level. More than 50 Bennington students have participated in Museum Fellows Term throughout the program's history.
Museum Fellows Term builds on Bennington’s history of innovation in work-integrated and self-directed learning and combines a framework of historical and contemporary contexts with practical, firsthand experiences, which allows students to become both participants in and observers of the art ecosystems of New York.
In five months, this strategically designed program concentrates a breadth of experiences and range of learning that could otherwise take years to accumulate and helps to drive and shape fellows' thinking about their future studies and ambitions.
This year, in addition to welcoming back eight returning partners, Bennington College is excited to be partnering with The Kitchen, one of New York City's oldest nonprofit spaces, as an internship host for the first time. Fatima Zaidi '16, who participated in Museum Fellows Term in 2015 is now director of development at The Kitchen and returns as an internship supervisor for the program.
"As the program enters its eleventh year, I'm thrilled to welcome our largest cohort to date and excited that one of the very first participants, Fatma Zaidi '16, in her capacity as Director of Development at The Kitchen, is now working with us as an internship supervisor. It's a joy to create these incredible learning and professional development opportunities for our students and thrilling to watch them find their paths post-graduation," said Visual Arts faculty member and program director Elizabeth White. "We are grateful, as always, to the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, for their long standing partnership and ongoing support of the program."
Over Museum Fellows Term, Frankenthaler Fellows live together in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. They gain a robust understanding of the art world through readings, visits to dozens of major cultural institutions around New York City, and connections with cultural leaders in diverse fields of expertise. Frankenthaler Fellows learn within a supportive, small co-learning community facilitated by Bennington faculty and receive individual mentorship and self-directed customization in accordance with students’ areas of interest.
During 2025 orientation week in New York City, Frankenthaler Fellows paid visits to MoMA, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Brooklyn Museum, and Center for Art, Research and Alliances (CARA). They also joined program alumni for a welcome dinner.
In addition to their internships, Frankenthaler Fellows meet as a cohort at the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation for faculty-led courses, including Historical Perspectives, taught by Sergio Bessa, chief curator emeritus at the Bronx Museum, which examines the forces and individuals that have shaped the evolution of museums and other art institutions; Contemporary Art Contexts, which focuses on contemporary art exhibitions and the organizations that support and present the work; and Research Colloquium, a framework providing practical support and critical contextual information about multiple aspects of the art world. Frankenthaler Fellows will also have the opportunity to meet with staff at the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation in a series of conversations arranged by Manager of Educational Initiatives Rachael Pullin.
Follow @benningtonmft on Instagram for a look at past and current program activities.
2025 Frankenthaler Fellows
- Zinariya Ali '26, Curatorial and Education Intern
- Julia Chow '26, Exhibitions and Collections Intern
- Aviva Feinberg '26, Archives and Learning and Engagement Intern
Lower Manhattan Cultural Council (LMCC)
- Mac Goulis '26, Operations Intern
- Lorelei Kurowski '26, Development Intern
Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture
- Carissa Lombardi, Archives Intern
- June Meuser '26, Curatorial, Development, and Education Intern
- Joy Stacy '26, Collections Intern
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Holland Williams '26, Curatorial Intern
About the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation
The Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, established and endowed by the artist during her lifetime (1928-2011), became active in 2013, on the closing of Frankenthaler’s estate. The Foundation is dedicated to promoting greater public interest in and understanding of the visual arts. It supports the artist’s legacy through a variety of initiatives, including exhibitions, loans of artworks, research and publications, conservation, grants, educational programs for the public and the scholarly community, and the publishing of a catalogue raisonné. As the principal beneficiary of Frankenthaler’s estate, its holdings include an extensive selection of her work in a variety of media, her collection of works by other artists, and original papers and materials pertaining to her life and work.