Director of Collections Maureen St. Onge, former Artwork Research Intern Gio Becerra, Manager of Educational Initiatives Rachael Pullin, and Project Assistant of the Helen Frankenthaler Catalogue Raisonné Valerie Rodriguez in HFF’s collections storage viewing Frankenthaler’s Overture (1992).
Internships
Internships at the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation are at the heart of our educational mission. We are committed to a student-centered approach and provide our interns with immersive access to the work of artist-endowed foundations and visual arts professions more broadly. The Foundation currently offers two types of internships: Nine-week summer internships in partnership with the Arts Intern College Program and six-week internships in collaboration with Bennington College.
Each HFF internship experience is crafted to be adaptive to the unique interests, needs, and skill sets of our students to allow for the greatest possible development during their time with the Foundation. Internships at the Foundation prepare students with résumé-enhancing skills and provide opportunities for research and publication. Throughout each internship, we facilitate opportunities to engage with our network of colleagues to further support the next generation of artists, scholars, and arts professionals in building connections within the field.
Artist Legacy Coalition
The Helen Frankenthaler Foundation is a member of the Artist Legacy Coalition, a multi-site summer internship program hosted by artist foundations and cultural organizations in the greater New York City area. We offer paid, nine-week summer internships (June 8–August 7, 2026) for undergraduate students and recent graduates in the visual arts and related humanities fields. Designed around the principles of experiential learning, mentorship, and equity, the program provides students with meaningful, hands-on experience within leading artist-centered foundations. Interns work closely with arts professionals on projects that encompass archival and collections research, curatorial and publishing work, and the development of public and philanthropic initiatives—gaining direct insight into how artist legacies are preserved, interpreted, and activated across the cultural field. A curriculum of site visits to peer foundations, museums, and other arts organizations further extend the learning environment, building professional fluency and cross-institutional perspective. This program builds on a national three-year pilot developed by the Aspen Institute’s Artist-Endowed Foundations Initiative (AEFI).
Participating Artist Foundations
(Based in Greater New York City area, unless otherwise noted)
• Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts
• Anyone Can Fly Foundation
• Dedalus Foundation
• Helen Frankenthaler Foundation
• Renee & Chaim Gross Foundation
• Robert Rauschenberg Foundation
• Roy Lichtenstein Foundation
• Toshiko Takaezu Foundation
• Valerie J. Maynard Foundation (Internship based in Baltimore, MD)
• Woodman Family Foundation
For application details, please contact the respective host institutions directly.
The Helen Frankenthaler Foundation is seeking a Prints Initiative Intern for summer 2026. This internship is offered in partnership with the Arts Intern College Program through Studio in a School NYC. Applicants must be approved by the Arts Intern College Program prior to applying to the Foundation. Visit the Arts Intern website for further details and to apply.
Former Artwork Research Intern Valerie Rodriguez working in the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation Archives during her summer 2023 internship.
Summer Internships
The Foundation currently offers a competitive paid nine-week summer internship in partnership with the Arts Intern College Program, which is open to undergraduate students with backgrounds that are historically underrepresented in the visual arts.
Previous HFF interns have gained hands on experience conducting artwork examinations in our collections storage, documenting Frankenthaler’s work for the forthcoming catalogue raisonné, developing curatorial projects, and writing essays on artwork in the Foundation’s collection for publication on Nowscape.
Applications for Summer 2026 are now open. Please note that the Foundation does not accept applications directly. Visit Arts Intern for further details, eligibility requirements, and to apply.
Former Digital Asset Intern Marigold Green viewing Frankenthaler’s 10/29/52 (1952) at the Art Institute of Chicago during a trip to the 2024 College Art Association Conference.
Bennington College Internships
The Foundation has supported internships for Bennington students through the Creative Legacy Fellowship and Museum Fellows Term programs. For further information on our partnership and collaborations with this institution, visit our Bennington College page.
Former Artwork Research Intern Gio Becerra in the Foundation’s collections storage with Director of Collections Maureen St. Onge examining Helen Frankenthaler’s Summer Picture (1959).
Summer Internship Spotlight: Gio Becerra
In summer 2024, Giovanna Becerra joined the Foundation as our Artwork Research Intern. Gio is an artist and senior at SUNY Purchase studying sculpture and anthropology. In her creative practice, she explores the intersection between craft and fine art, as well as the origin of folklore and its unconscious influence on Ecuadorian society. During her time with HFF, Gio supported a major, ongoing photography and research project cataloguing framed works on paper in the Foundation’s collection. She gained hands-on experience examining and documenting artwork in our collections storage and recorded the information obtained from her research in the Foundation’s database. Over the course of the internship, Gio completed cataloguing for fifty works on paper and drew from her experiences to write a forthcoming article on Frankenthaler’s collage that will appear on Nowscape.