People of Rochester - Charlotte

Charlotte’s been an illustration major at RIT for the past two years. She wants to work in an art museum, and she says the Norman Rockwell museum would be her dream job. She loves his work and says it would be great to be around it.

She doesn’t usually paint at the Lake Ontario shore, but she wanted to be productive while her boyfriend was sailing. She’s been painting since high school. Charlotte said she does a lot of “master studies,” where she tries to recreate paintings done by master artists. In trying to copy a master’s painting, it helps her learn how they did it.

She looks forward to school “getting back to normal,” because she feels that personal interaction is especially important for her particular area of study. For example, if you're a math major, Charlotte says, you can do math on a computer. But with art and illustration, there’s a lot of up-close watching and observation needed for students to be able to learn various techniques. When you're painting or illustrating in a virtual classroom, you can’t necessarily see what you're doing wrong, and you're just hoping you're getting it right.

Charlotte is fully vaccinated, and she has a part-time job in a retail environment. The store where she works is one of the few places that won’t allow customers to enter unless they’re wearing a mask. She says there have been a lot of customers who don't seem to understand the concept of a mask. In spite of this, hardly anyone has gotten angry or belligerent yet.

She’s the president of the RIT Outing Club, and a lot of her club members have gone out together on hikes. For example, they've gone backpacking and camping in the Adirondacks, but they can't do overnight trips during the pandemic. RIT has set a limit, where students can’t go beyond a certain radius outside the city. This has limited a lot of trips that they can take.

Charlotte has tried to keep the club together, but a lot of members aren't participating because the club can't take the fun trips they’re used to. They’re restricted to doing things like walking the Erie Canal trail, which isn’t adventurous enough for many diehard club members.

She’s been in restaurants, depending on how cautious the restaurant is about maintaining or following health-safety guidelines. Charlotte said some restaurants are conscientious and others clearly don't care. She and her friends avoid those.

It’s been over a year since she’s seen a movie in a theater. She and her friends are considering returning to a theater by taking advantage of the offer to rent a theater for a small group of people.

Thanks, Charlotte!