Discovering Performing Arts Resources

Ramona Riedzewski

V&A Archivist and Conservation Manager

APAC Treasurer and Membership Secretary

Discovering Collections; Discovering Communities 13 October 2015

Use of Performance data

•  Researchers – use of performance event data to trace movement of people and companies, frequency of plays, etc.

•  Genealogy – particularly 19th century for which no printed data exist

•  Industry – a tool for companies and artistic directors to assess production histories and do seasonal forward planning (how often was a certain work performed in an area in recent years?)

•  Information Professionals – an authoritative dataset to reference relevant materials in a consistent manner across information standards and systems

Ellen Terry as Beatrice in Much Ado about Nothing, Lyceum Theatre, London, 1882.

Wouldn’titbenicetohaveanIMDbsortofdatabasefortheUKperformingarts?

Vision 1

Vision 2

Vision 3

Facility to document all past, current and future productions / live performance

Establishment of an authoritative data set

Facilitate access to relevant resources

Overview / General vision

The early days / first steps

•  Early 2000s – Theatre Information Group (TIG) – now APAC – tried to find opportunities to develop a national repertoire database documenting past, current and future UK performances

•  2005 – TIG received a grant to fund a pilot project to develop a national data standard to capture UK repertoire data

•  2012-2015 – AHRC funded Staging Beckett project to carry out a major research on all of Samuel Beckett’s productions (led by University of Reading with V&A and University of Chester as partners)

Shoes worn by Henry Irving in Richard III, Lyceum Theatre, London, 1896.

Staging Beckett Project: The Impact of Productions of Samuel Beckett’s Drama on Theatre Practice in the UK and Ireland

•  Revive 2005 data model and bring up to date

•  Implement technical infrastructure supporting the performance data model

•  Build API to retrieve Beckett data •  Create a dedicate research project

website within University of Reading’s website

•  And of course: carry out Beckett research.

•  www.reading.ac.uk/staging-beckett/

Alan Howard and Ben Kingsley in Waiting for Godot, London 1997.

PADB – Beckett Pilot Project

Achievements so far

•  The Beckett Project was a pilot project and lessons have been learnt.

•  A data model has been established. •  A “back-end” data infrastructure has been built.

•  International connections and potential collaborators made.

BAFTA Special Lifetime Achievement Award given to Ronnie Barker in 2003.

What next?

•  There are many opportunities and directions to take, but we need to ensure the delivery of a stable and sustainable resource.

•  Scalability of the project – what smaller projects could be done with small or existing resources and facilities, that will support the bigger picture?

Drawing by Voytek of Ian McKellen in Bent, 1979.

Challenges

•  Obtaining funding for the “front-end” development, including the general user interface and search functions, but also the record editing/creation/deletion interfaces.

•  Ongoing maintenance, hosting and support. •  Ideally, performance data should be gathered through

various means: •  Data ingests from organisations have their in-

house performance data sets (and who continue to add to it!), e.g. National Theatre, Royal Opera House, Royal Albert Hall, etc.

•  One-by-one record creation by registered users •  Potential crowdsourcing opportunities, e.g.

transcription of digitised materials •  International agreement of a performance data model

(VIAF). D’OylyCarteposterforPa#ence,PrincessTheatreLondon,ca.1919

Opportunities

•  APAC network – great enthusiasm and willingness to contribute data from member organisations and individuals; available expertise across the information professions (archivists, librarians, museum curators).

•  Potential funding opportunities, e.g. national or international – willing partners and collaborators amongst APAC and SIBMAS networks.

•  Smaller projects, that will support the vision of a consistent performance data set, e.g. UK Theatre venue authority dataset using the Australian Ausstage database and functionality.

Vivien Leigh and Laurence Olivier, Anthony and Cleopatra, St James’s, 1951

And finally....

Rocky Horror Show, Royal Court, 16 June 1973

….Anideaofwhatweareaimingfor:

www.ausstage.edu.au/

hLps://www.ausstage.edu.au/pages/event/106873

Thank you.

APAC Membership enquiries

membership@performingartscollection.org.uk

or

r.riedzewski@vam.ac.uk