Experiential Learning in Arts Management
Impact Before You Graduate
As a Master of Arts Management student, you will complete a team-based project, working in close collaboration with a real-world client. Heinz College sources these clients—museums, art galleries, theaters—to find projects that benefit both you and client. The ideal project forces you to expand beyond your comfort zone, work with imperfect data, learn to work in a group setting, and apply the skills you acquired in class to an actual business challenge. It also provides something of value to the client.
Recent Capstone Clients
- The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA)
- The Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
- Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre
- Pittsburgh Cultural Trust
- National Theatre Institute/Eugene O'Neill Center
- globalFEST
- Rivers of Steel Arts
- Phillips Connection
- Pittsburgh Opera
- Carnegie Museum of Art
- Greater Pittsburgh Arts Council
- Jacob's Pillow Dance
- Mattress Factory Museum
- American Alliance of Museums
- Arts Ed Collaborative
Their report was packed with so much research, including community interviews and quantitative data. I still refer back to it now when I’m writing grant proposals or we are doing strategic planning.
Jody Guy
Founder and Director, Center for Civic Arts | Capstone Client
Arts Management Summer Internships
You will complete a 10-week, full-time internship during the summer between your first and second years.
Our students stay busy in the summer and gain invaluable industry experience. We caught up with a few of them on site as they completed internships with some amazing organizations.
Networking and Industry Trips
The Arts Management program organizes a number of unique opportunities for networking with and gaining insight from top industry professionals. These opportunities include conferences, industry trips, speakers, and Network New York, which has become a centerpiece of the program's first year. We organize other cohort trips to Washington, DC and other cultural centers as well.
New York City is a global center of culture and entertainment, and many Arts Management graduates complete their summer internships in NYC and/or find employment there after graduation.
Each October, Heinz College hosts a two-day career development event called "Network New York." This event, just seven weeks into the first semester of the program, gives our students their first opportunity to network with potential internship sponsors and to participate in business seminars with leadership from fine and performing arts organizations, museums, producers, exhibitors, and more.
We typically go on-site to meet with professionals at various institutions, including the Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, Whitney Museum of American Art, and many others. In recent years, Network New York has featured networking, panels, and events with industry experts from:
- Brooklyn Academy of Music
- Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
- The Public Theater
- Carnegie Hall
- Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater
- Andrew W. Mellon Foundation
- Guggenheim Museum
- New York Foundation for the Arts
- KPMG
- Capacity Interactive
- UNIX Gallery
- James Cohan Gallery
- International Society for the Performing Arts
- New York Live Arts
- Whitney Museum of American Art
- David Zwirner Gallery
- Asia Society
- Doris Duke Center for Islamic Art
Throughout both years of the program, additional one-off presentations, seminars, and performances introduce you to a wide array of industry professionals. This constant exposure to varying experiences, work styles, and other insights will help you shape your career vision. You are encouraged to make connections with speakers who inspire you, and you may even find yourself interning at that speaker’s organization. We also regularly program Arts Management alumni panels.
Recent seminar and course guest speakers have included:
- Aubrey Bergauer, Arts Management Consultant, Author and Speaker
- Chiho Feindler, Sr. Director of Programs and Policy, VH1 Save the Music Foundation
- Jill Robinson, President and CEO, TRG Arts
- Danielle Linzer, Curator of Education & Interpretation, Andy Warhol Museum / Whitney Museum of American Art
- David Baile, Executive Director, International Society for the Performing Arts
- Julie Burros, Chief of Arts & Culture, City of Boston
- Zeyba Rahman, Senior Program Officer, Doris Duke Charitable Foundation for Islamic Art
- Glenn Lowry, Director, Museum of Modern Art (MoMA)
Each year, we sponsor a number of Arts Management students to attend prominent arts management and leadership conferences, including:
- Americans for the Arts
- American Alliance of Museums
- Association of Performing Arts Presenters
- National Arts Marketing Project
- Museums and the Web
AMT LAB: Arts Management & Technology Laboratory
Widely considered an asset to the field of arts management as a whole, AMT Lab is a Carnegie Mellon University Arts Management research center serving as an exchange, a catalyst for innovative ideas, and a conduit for knowledge circulating at the intersection of arts, management, and technology.
Each year, many of our students work within AMT Lab as paid researchers and contributors. These positions offer many opportunities for publication, dialogue with practitioners, and exposure to the latest innovations in arts technology.
AMT Lab provides current and future arts managers, technologists, and researchers with existing best practices and emerging technologies that allow for a direct impact on their work and their organization. AMT Lab is a resource that leads to innovative, effective, and efficient integration of technology in the cultural and creative enterprise space.
