Keeping the Performance Alive

Dynamic Performing Arts Archives that Include the Audience

Nature of Performing ArtsDYNAMIC AUDIENCE LIVE

Evolving Unique

Unique Interaction Continuing

dialogue

Momentary

To archive or not to archive?NO Authoritative

accounts The archive is frozen Best kept in our

memories An imposition of

power

YES Their cultural and

historical significance Archive does not have

to be a substitute or a perfect representation

Solution: Honor the Performing Arts in the Archive

REUSE By public By practitioners By scholars/researchers and

students

PROGRAMMING Exhibitions Workshops Lectures Screenings Readings Performances

AUDIENCE Interviews Videos of audience Online forums for discussion Databases of user

contributions

WEB 2.0 Digitized collections Multimedia Interaction Relationships

The Ideal IngredientsFor creating a dynamic, living performing arts archive

Promotion

Promote awareness and use of the archive

o Publisho Research Initiativeso News Articleso Go to practitioners

and tell them about your services

o Make sure that you, your website, and your facilities are welcoming and usable

Programming

“If its existence is not known, if it does not coexist with the city, the people, the scholars . . . It is a dead archive.”

o Workshopso Lectureso Exhibitionso Performanceso Readingso Screenings

Be Proactive

“. . . A concerted effort needs to be made, while the performance is created and executed, to document as much as possible of it and to preserve the materials that the performance generates . . . it is a primary concern of repositories to actively promote or contribute to the documentation of performance.”

“Information professionals cannot be passive, because, in theater, sources need to be actively created and sought, otherwise they easily disappear or they do not even come into existence.”

-Francesca Marini

o Actively collect materials

o Interview audience members

o Interview/perform oral histories with practitioners

Website

Transcend the confines of archive on the Web.

InterfaceUsability

Featureso Digitized collections

o Multimediao Show relationshipso Interactivity/ allow

comments

Website

Transcend the confines of archive on the Web.

InterfaceUsability

Featureso Digitized collections

o Multimediao Show relationshipso Interactivity/ allow

comments

Each name is linked to a list of other productions that person was associated with.

Movies include multiple performances and rehearsals

Website

Features, continued

o User inputo Ask for audience

interpretations, reactions, opinions, emotions

o Materials – photos, programs (that the archive doesn’t have)

o Videos, blog, entries, etc. could be embedded or added to link lists

Website

Features, continued

o User inputo Ask for audience

interpretations, reactions, opinions, emotions

o Materials – photos, programs (that the archive doesn’t have)

Website

Features, continueso Interactivity

o Comments

“The archive only has a legacy by living

on.”-Jones, Abbott, and

Ross