Meet The MIA: Maggie Davis
Maggie Davis
Collection Maintenance Technician
Years employed at the MIA: 10 (Yikes!)
Describe something interesting or unusual about your work here:
My job is so hard to describe because it involves so many different responsibilities. I guess the most interesting part of my job is that I get to clean the artwork; dust paintings and sculptures in the galleries, polish silver in a lab. I’m also in charge of the museum’s Integrated Pest Management (IPM) System. That involves the identification of bugs found in the museum, assessing if they are harmful to the collection, and acting accordingly based upon identification. So if people find a bug in the museum, they capture it, bring it to me, and it’s my job to find out if it’s just a garden beetle or (gulp) something worse.
What was your first job?
My first job was at Bruegger’s Bagels in Dinkytown! I was in high school, and I worked with all college kids. I thought I was pretty cool at the time (and can assure you I wasn’t). I remember going to Ragstock and the Purple Onion coffee shop on my breaks. After college I accepted a full time position in The Museum Shop here at the MIA. I checked in the orders and priced the merchandise.
What’s hanging on your walls?
At work, pictures of my daughter Lucy, a poster of common museum pests, postcards of art I like. At home, it’s just as eclectic. Silk-screened concert posters, framed old maps, quirky “art” I picked up at thrift stores. My favorites are these wooden painted birds from Anthropologie and a Jay Ryan poster for one of my favorite bands, The Frames.
If you weren’t a Collection Maintenance Technician, what would you be?
If money, time and intelligence level were of no factor, I would be an archeologist living in Britain researching Neolithic sites. I’m fascinated with British history. An Anglophile, as I’ve heard it coined! I even have a mini Stonehenge set that my husband gave me for Christmas. I think he was making fun of me, but I love it anyway!
Photo: Dan Dennehy
Meet The MIA: Maggie Davis
Maggie Davis
Collection Maintenance Technician
Years employed at the MIA: 10 (Yikes!)
Describe something interesting or unusual about your work here:
My job is so hard to describe because it involves so many different responsibilities. I guess the most interesting part of my job is that I get to clean the artwork; dust paintings and sculptures in the galleries, polish silver in a lab. I’m also in charge of the museum’s Integrated Pest Management (IPM) System. That involves the identification of bugs found in the museum, assessing if they are harmful to the collection, and acting accordingly based upon identification. So if people find a bug in the museum, they capture it, bring it to me, and it’s my job to find out if it’s just a garden beetle or (gulp) something worse.
What was your first job?
My first job was at Bruegger’s Bagels in Dinkytown! I was in high school, and I worked with all college kids. I thought I was pretty cool at the time (and can assure you I wasn’t). I remember going to Ragstock and the Purple Onion coffee shop on my breaks. After college I accepted a full time position in The Museum Shop here at the MIA. I checked in the orders and priced the merchandise.
What’s hanging on your walls?
At work, pictures of my daughter Lucy, a poster of common museum pests, postcards of art I like. At home, it’s just as eclectic. Silk-screened concert posters, framed old maps, quirky “art” I picked up at thrift stores. My favorites are these wooden painted birds from Anthropologie and a Jay Ryan poster for one of my favorite bands, The Frames.
If you weren’t a Collection Maintenance Technician, what would you be?
If money, time and intelligence level were of no factor, I would be an archeologist living in Britain researching Neolithic sites. I’m fascinated with British history. An Anglophile, as I’ve heard it coined! I even have a mini Stonehenge set that my husband gave me for Christmas. I think he was making fun of me, but I love it anyway!
Photo: Dan Dennehy