Meet a Colleague: Meaghan Walsh

Meet a Colleague: Meaghan Walsh Meaghan Walsh serves as the Louise C. Herreshoff Curatorial Fellow for American Art.

W&L News Office
January 21, 2026

Q. How long have you worked at W&L?
I have been at W&L for seven months.

Q. What is the favorite aspect of your job at W&L?
I absolutely adore my colleagues and coming to work to see them and collaborate is a highlight of my day. As for the work side of my job, I love telling stories through art. Engaging with students and the public through exhibition tours, object study sessions and lectures is my favorite part of working in a museum.

Q. If you chose a different path, what other career would you have?
I originally wanted to be a Crime Scene Investigator but turns out I don't like blood. So, I translated that initial interest into a museum career, conducting investigations through art objects and discovering the secrets that they can reveal. No blood included.

Q. Where did you grow up?
I grew up in Northern Virginia about 10 miles outside of Washington, D.C.

Q. What three words describe you best?
I had to crowdsource these, since I came up with zany qualifiers, but according to my research group of two, I am warm, funny and vibrant.

Q. Name one person from history you would like to spend a day with and why.
James Abbott McNeill Whistler. He was a late 19th-century American painter who lived most of his life as an expat in Paris and London. He was an absolute diva who palled around with other prominent painters, like Gustave Courbet, and had one of the most insane libel cases in history against the critic John Ruskin that Whistler won but bankrupted himself in the process. I would hang with him for the plot-and to meet some cool artists, but mostly for the shenanigans.

Q. Who is the most famous person you have met and where did you meet them?
Michael Jordan. I met him at an All-Star basketball game that I played in at the MCI Center (or whatever it's called now) when I was 13 and he was playing for the Washington Wizards. After the game he came and shook all our hands. I told him that I liked him in "Space Jam."

Q. What is your biggest pet peeve?
Billionaires.

Q. What do you like to do away from work?
I love cooking and baking. I spend my weekends trying out new recipes and making food for friends and family. My current adventure is with sourdough. Turns out trying to start this journey in the fall when it's cold is a recipe for failure.

Q. What is your least favorite chore at home?
Dusting. No matter how frequently I do it, it just keeps returning.

Q. What is your favorite family holiday tradition?
This is both my favorite and least favorite tradition that we do on birthdays in my family, which is butter each other's noses. When I was younger, you would be rudely awakened by a butter smear on the schnoz (which was tempered by a hot cinnamon roll with a candle in it). Now that we're all older, it has become a game of strategy to avoid being buttered and to find sneaky ways to butter the birthday person. Not technically a holiday tradition, but one that I think fondly on (except on my birthday).

Q. What is your all-time favorite food or food dish?
Soup. I know, so boring, but hear me out. It is one of the most versatile dishes in global cuisine. Every culture has a soup. It can be light and delicate, thick and hearty, hot or cold, spicy or smokey…and it's somehow always comforting.

Q. What is your all-time favorite book?
"The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue" by V.E. Schwab. The novel is about a woman who, in a moment of desperation, makes a Faustian bargain to live forever only to be forgotten by everyone she meets. It is a painfully beautiful narrative about an insatiable desire to live and to be remembered. I cannot recommend this book enough.

Q. If you could choose one series to binge-watch, what would it be?
I have been hearing good things about "Slow Horses," so I think that would be my next binge (Anyone want to share their AppleTV log in?).

Q. What is your all-time favorite movie?
"The Sting" (1973).

Q. What song or artist could you play on repeat?
I am very much a mood listener so my tastes change from day to day, but if I am working on a deadline I can guarantee that I am listening to the "Lord of the Rings" soundtrack on repeat (I am in the top 0.01% of Howard Shore listeners every year lol) and if I am cooking or hosting a dinner party, I'm playing Sam Cooke.

Q. Tell us something most people don't know about you.
I used to be a bus driver in undergrad! It was an extrovert's dream-a continuous stream of passengers who were temporarily held captive on the bus and forced to keep my company?! Best job ever.