Staff Page Updates
Posted on 21/09/2025 by Amherst Pounce
Hello, everyone! It has certainly been a while since we’ve posted a new update. Things at BICI have been moving along as usual. Laura Cee has settled well into her new role here. While I miss leading tours, I have to admit, it’s nice to have a few less responsibilities than before… (-:
Our Benefactor has been stopping by BICI more often these days, which means that the time I used to spend assisting patrons has transitioned towards more time spent in meetings together. While part of it must be due to our Benefactor’s desire to see their selected candidate’s work, I often catch them spending time in the portion of the physical exhibit that showcases our records from the Tending Grounds and the Lost Village. I suspect it’s their favorite portion, though they’ve never actually said as much to me.
Personally, my favorite portion of the exhibit pertains to the Hall of Kindling and Charcoal. You may not know this, but my family has an incredibly special connection to the Hall.
Before I stray too off topic, I’m proud to say that our staff page is fully updated. Laura Cee’s information was added to the staff page, apparently thanks to R. M. Gardener’s efforts. While it’s unfortunate that they both had other matters to attend to during our staff photography session, at least we finally have professional quality headshots for Ellsyx, Aimi, and myself. We meant to take these months ago, as the ones we had previously are incredibly outdated, but better late than never, I suppose!
You can visit our updated staff page here.
Amherst
Welcome to Our Newest Staff Member!
Posted on 26/07/2025 by Amherst Pounce
Hello, everyone. I feel as though it’s been ages since I last posted on the website. And, after looking at my last news post… it appears that it has. My apologies to you all.
Things at BICI (I am re-doubling my efforts to make this name stick!) have been intense over the past few weeks, to say the least. I originally expected our preparations to launch the next portion of the digital archive, 10.02.5607 A.o.W. to 30.02.5607 A.o.W, pertaining to the Tending Grounds, the Lost Village, to only take a couple of weeks. Likewise, I expected opening our digital storefront to be much easier than it actually has been. We have a physical gift shop, with many goods already in stock — surely it wouldn’t be difficult to ship those out, right?
Alas, I was not right. )-:
What made matters more difficult were the changes that have occurred over the past few weeks. As Institute Director, I tend to have the largest sway in the overall direction of our hallowed institution. Since taking on this role, my goal has been to showcase our rich and varied history to the public, and for the public to see us as a destination just as prestigious as The National Berelyse Museum of Art and as The Strinarre Historical Archives. People tend to forget that we have existed for far longer than either of those institutions… and yes, while we may have a fraction of their budgets and just a sliver of their staffing, what we lack in numbers we make up for in dedication.
We’ve recently acquired additional funding that will allow us to bring on another full time staff member to help assist the team, particularly with tours and other in-person events. While previously, I handled the bulk of the in-person tours, my duties have evolved such that I no longer have the time to spare that I once did.
This is where our Benefactor stepped in. Our Benefactor is not usually involved in hiring, or in day-to-day matters of the Institute, but this opening seemed to particularly spark our Benefactor’s interest. After a bit of back-and-forth, we came to an agreement on our newest candidate. Now, I am proud to introduce our newest staffer, Laura Cee, to you all.
Laura will be in charge of not only our in-person tours, but other educational programs and outreach here at the Institute. She has exciting plans for our in-person presence. I heard something about teaching a dance class the other day. I’m both curious and admittedly a little nervous to see how that will turn out…
Laura will not have much interaction with the digital portion of the Institute, or with its archives. Still, as we are a small staff, there is a chance you may see her presence on our site. If you do see a news post or a social media post written by her, please be sure to extend to her your warmest welcomes.
As for the launch of the next portion of our archive, I expect us to be ready to go by early “August”, as Ellsyx calls it. For next Tuesday’s update, we will debut another piece of artwork created by Aimi, illustrating one of the most… discussed figures in all the archives. She did a wonderful job on the piece; I hope you are all excited to view it!
Amherst
Announcing Our First Contributing Artist!
Posted on 11/06/2025 by Aimi
HOWDY EVERYONE!!! 🥳 This is Aimi, the Institute’s Art Director! I’m happy to announce that we have a piece up from our very first contributing artist!!
Gin has been a longtime friend of the Institute and an artist I’ve admired for years! I’m honored to work with them on bringing part of our special exhibition to life. I speak for the entire Institute when I say we were BLOWN AWAY by their amazing art!!
The piece was unfortunately damaged in transit, but we are working hard to reconstitute the full illustration. Until then we’ve uploaded the initial piece to the website. The full piece will be uploaded later on once Gardener and I can sprinkle some magic on it!
Please look at Gin’s gorgeous art here on our site, but give it some love on social media too! You can find it here on Bluesky and here on Twitter.
We’ll also be bringing on more contributing artists as we continue to update the site. Please give them a warm welcome when they join!!
Aimi