FSU/KCAD and ArtPrize partnership empowers student art careers

When Maylyn Southavilai started volunteering with ArtPrize in 2023, she didn’t expect it would change her life. Then a first-year student at Ferris State University’s Kendall College of Art and Design, she spent her days helping the nonprofit’s staff coordinate events and manage volunteers.

“Volunteering is one of my biggest passions. It helps connect and unify the community,” Southavilai says. “That’s when I met (Kailey Smith-Barth, ArtPrize’s exhibitions and internship manager), and she was like, ‘Hey, you should apply to be an intern next year.’”

A year later, she did. Southavilai landed the ArtPrize events intern position and spent the summer juggling classes, planning events, and learning to navigate one of the country’s most high-energy art festivals.

“During that process, I learned a lot,” she says. “It was a lot of under-pressure things, but it was also a good balance between learning about work and school. ArtPrize is a high-intensity festival. You’re always on the go, but they make sure your mental and physical health are in check and that you get the experiences you want through the internship.”

Her internship opened doors to new experiences and connections. 

“I absolutely love the hands-on experience with ArtPrize,” she says. “You get to see so many different avenues and processes. I learned how to network more professionally, met artists from around the world, and went to events I’d never experienced before. It puts you in a position to put yourself out there.”

By the end of the internship, Southavilai had earned the MVP Internship Award, followed by a job offer. Today, she’s a volunteer assistant manager at ArtPrize while continuing her studies full-time.

Southavilai says winning the internship brought her to the institution that helped kindle her interest in art. She remembers when her sister, Becky Saldana, took her to ArtPrize when she was growing up. and the experience motivated her to attend KCAD. 

“ When I received the internship, it was a huge full-circle moment for me,” she says. “I fulfilled my childhood dreams.”

Revived after COVID

The internship that launched Southavilai’s career came from a collaboration between ArtPrize and KCAD created to rebuild professional opportunities for students after the pandemic.

When the COVID-19 shutdowns hit, ArtPrize canceled its 2020 competition and paused many programs that connected students to the city’s art community. By 2021, the organization was rebuilding with a smaller staff and a renewed mission as a nonprofit.

Smith-Barth had firsthand experience with the gap that students faced.

“I actually started as an intern at ArtPrize in 2018,” she says. “When I returned to the team in 2022 after the pandemic, the internship program was no longer at that point, so we didn’t have one in 2021 or 2022.”

In 2023, she was determined to bring the program back.

“I created a proposal for our team and our executive director, which was then approved and taken to KCAD,” Smith-Barth says. “The proposal outlined how the program functions — the positions, timelines, all that fun stuff — and what the sponsorship would look like coming from Kendall.”

The college responded enthusiastically. Ferris and KCAD agreed to fund the program, while ArtPrize would manage interns in day-to-day roles across its departments. The first new cohort launched that same year.

Attracting students

The paid program gives students hands-on experience in departments ranging from communications and design to hospitality and development.

The 18-week internship begins at the end of May and lasts until the beginning of October, the week after the event, with one intern working from May to May. The exhibitions intern assists with year-round programming as well. The internship pays $15 an hour, the Ferris student pay rate. Interns can also apply for academic credit.

Interest in the program has grown rapidly. 

“We had about 50 applications last year,” she says. “I had students tell me they weren’t telling their friends about it because they wanted the opportunity so bad. They were really gunning for it.”

This year, four interns came from Kendall and two from Ferris. Since 2023, 16 students have participated, with some, like Southavilai, returning as staff.

“This is our third year with the program,” Smith-Barth says. “We’ve also had students who’ve been hired back onto the team, too. I’m really excited to see that collaboration and to see students continue working through their careers.”

For students, the program’s biggest draw is the opportunity to experience what it takes to make a major public art event happen.

“Usually the highlights are centered around their interactions with both the visitors and the artists and how that has impacted them,” Smith-Barth says. “Lots of times, it’s a realization that they can do it, too. They can be an ArtPrize artist, or they can be a part of ArtPrize in many different ways.”

Interns work alongside ArtPrize staff for months before the festival, helping with logistics, communications, and community outreach.

New experiences

Southavilai says the environment pushed her out of her comfort zone in the best way. 

“Eventually, it got easier to talk to anyone around me and hear different stories about ArtPrize,  how impactful it is not just to artists, but to guests and volunteers,” she says. “My biggest thing is just you need community. We’re humans. We need to connect.”

That sense of community is central to the program’s success. ArtPrize staff hold regular check-ins to support student interns juggling classwork and festival deadlines.

“We had weekly meetings with our department head check-ins, usually weekly,” Southavilai says. “They’d give you little checklists and make sure the workload wasn’t too much. They always respected our boundaries and made sure we put school first, because at the end of the day, getting our degree is the most important part.”

Students from both KCAD and Ferris describe their experiences as transformative, both professionally and personally.

Liv Miller, a senior illustration major at KCAD, completed a hospitality internship this year.

“Before the event started, I was mostly working on answering in the support inbox,” Miller says. “Since the ClubHouse has opened, I’ve been helping with venue signage pickup and artist bag and badge pickup. I also worked at Arborialis, a luminarium set up at 555 Monroe for the event.”

They say the experience taught them more than technical skills. 

“I am learning a lot, most of it comes down to confidence,  where to set boundaries and ask for help,” Miller says. “Everyone on the team has been very patient and encouraging. Furthermore, I realized that I have a passion for working in the art community. I love creating art, and I also enjoy working with artists.”

Hayley Lingo, a Ferris State senior completing her degree this fall, interned with the digital media team.

Her role was to assist the digital media manager, Ally Fulton, with creating copy for social captions, creating and sharing content, and constructing emails for artists, venues, and the public. Lingo also helped plan the portfolio review day, a collaboration among all six interns that invited artists, students, and the public to receive feedback from professionals.

“This internship has been an incredible learning experience both professionally and personally,” Lingo says. “I feel extremely grateful for my manager, Ally, and all of the knowledge she has shared throughout this experience. The Opening Ceremony was inspiring, seeing all of the ArtPrize team’s hard work pay off and the community coming together to support the arts.”

Sydney Lingenfelter, who graduated from KCAD in May with a major in studio arts and a  minor in analog photo, has been an exhibitions intern since school ended. Tasks vary from working on-site installing artwork to serving as a liaison between artists and venues via email. 

“The exhibitions team is at the heart of the festival, working directly with the artists and venues that make ArtPrize happen,” Lingenfelter says. “My internship has been very split between two worlds: my office world and my on-site world. I spend a lot of time sitting at my desk, doing the digital side of organizing artwork for the festival; and I do work on-site, assisting in putting the exhibitions up. 

“This has allowed me to gain a lot of curatorial experience and make new connections. A couple projects I had while being an intern were organizing portfolio review day and curating a show with my artist collective VEIL at Hermitage at Diamond.”

Lingenfelter describes her time with ArtPrize as beyond anything she imagined. She credits the internship with opening many doors in a short time. 

“It’s such a privilege to be able to work in my field right after graduation, and that’s part of what makes this opportunity so important,” she says. “I’ll be leaving this internship with far more curatorial knowledge than I began with. I do believe it has set me up for success, and I’m excited to see what’s next.”

‘Huge jumping-off point’

The internship program also deepens ArtPrize’s ties with education. Smith-Barth, who earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Kendall, says her internship was life-changing.

“I was the exhibitions intern in 2018, my first ArtPrize in general,” she says. “I worked with a lot of artists on installations and activations. I also had a day working with ArtPrize education, which was really beneficial. It was awesome seeing how we’ve collaborated with the community over the years.

“It was a huge jumping-off point for me,” she adds. “I wouldn’t have gotten my job in 2022 or be here now without it. I’m very grateful for the experience and where it’s taken me.”

That experience is what drives her to mentor today’s students. “We even took a field trip to Michigan State University,” she says. “We went to the Eli and Edith Broad Museum and had a personal tour with Dr. Rachel Winter, their assistant curator. That was a really fun day and a great bonding experience.”

Since ArtPrize became a nonprofit and partnered with KCAD and Ferris, the collaboration has shown how local institutions can join forces to nurture emerging talent. The program is at capacity, but Smith-Barth hopes it will eventually grow.

“In the future, seeing this program expand would be ideal.”

For now, the program continues to serve as a training ground for students who want to work in the arts and a reminder that creativity can drive opportunity.

“ArtPrize is all about community and working together through art,” Southavilai says. “That’s why I love it.”

Photos courtesy of Maylyn Southavilai, Sydney Lingenfelter, Kailey Smith-Barth, and Liv Miller.

From furniture to shoes, from arts to education to even policy creation, design is everywhere you look. Designed in Michigan, a story series coming out of West Michigan, is devoted to sharing the expansive role design plays in Michigan’s past, present and future. It is made possible through the support of Kendall College of Art and Design of Ferris State University.