Careers in Creativity: Alum Valerie Gay of The Barnes
February 18, 2020
We reached out to Valerie Gay BM ’89 (Vocal Performance), whose career spans from performance to financial planning and beyond. Though she has a degree in vocal performance, Gay has had a 20-year career in nonprofit leadership and was recently appointed deputy director for audience engagement and chief experience officer of the Barnes Foundation.
We asked Gay how her time at UArts influenced the trajectory of her multifaceted career. After graduation, she worked as a banker for PNC while continuing to sing, and became a certified financial planner. Her UArts education helped her thrive as a banker “because I was creative—I saw things other people couldn’t see,” Gay said. Bolstered by her creativity, she eventually developed a customer relationship management system, technology that helps companies communicate with current and future customers, that was used at PNC in Philadelphia and surrounding areas.
This entrepreneurial spirit grew from the mentorship she received at UArts. One of her professors told her, “The difference between being good and great is five percent. You can be good, or you can work even harder and push to be great.” At the time, Gay pushed herself to be great by mentoring fellow students who were struggling. That opportunity provided the foundation for Gay to create Fortress Arts, a nonprofit that “provides an enriched learning environment that has helped countless students explore their own possibilities.”
At the Barnes, Gay focuses maintaining relationships with the museum’s visitors and oversees its programs, visitor experience team, and diversity and inclusion initiatives. “I get to advocate for amazing people,” Gay said when asked about the best part of her job. “I get to be sure that everyone who comes into the Barnes Foundation—a visitor, a volunteer, a student, paid guests—feels welcome, accepted [and] feels that there’s a connection between them [and] the exhibition.”
Gay encourages students to work on what makes them unique. “If eight people in the room can do what I can do, let me find the thing that only I can do,” she said. Further, Gay’s goal is to “empower and encourage others to do what they can do best.”
“Because I was creative—I saw things other people couldn’t see."
When asked about how UArts students can jumpstart their careers while still in school, Gay emphasized the importance of internships to gain professional experience. She encouraged students to explore internships available for students through Career Services. Gay told us that the best takeaway for students pursuing careers after graduation is to “go for it. We need artists. We need creatives. Creatives are in every walk of life and line of business. That’s the beauty of it.”