Société Internationale des Bibliothèques et des Musées des Arts du Spectacle

Evening address

by Margaret Benton, Chairman of SIBMAS

Documents et Temoignages des Arts du Spectacle: Pourquoi et Comment? / Collecting and Recording the Performing Arts: Why and How?

Société Internationale des Bibliothèques et des Musées des Arts du Spectacle / International Association of Libraries and Museums of the Performing Arts

20ème Congrès International / 20th International Congress

Antwerp 4-7 September 1994. Acta. Antwerp : 1995, p. 21

Good evening ladies and gentlemen.

I would like to welcome here this evening both the delegates to the SIBMAS conference and theatre-lovers from the city of Antwerp, as it is for promotion and study of theatre present and future that we dedicate our work.
The performing arts provide not only pleasure and inspiration, they include many of the core subjects taught in our schools and colleges, - drama, music, dance, social history and art and design. They transcend both time and national barriers. Yet live performance is the most ephemeral of arts. It lasts only as long as the memories of those who witness it. Without the playtexts, notation, scores, audio-visual recordings and other documentation in our performing arts collections and libraries, how many of the works of Shakespeare, Schiller, Mozart, Beethoven and countless other artists would exist today?

We are here to provide a public service - to you the users, the theatre profession, enthusiasts, researchers, teachers and students. We aim to document the performing arts and to educate and inform people through exhibitions, publications and teaching, to encourage new artists and to create a new audience for theatre. We also need your support to do this. In today's economic climate, even those who have not lived through the Thatcher years!, have to justify the value of their work. Our survival depends on the quality of the service we provide...

The purpose of our organisation is to promote international contact and the exchange of ideas between performing arts libraries, museums and documentation centres worldwide. This conference is an act of faith. The members of this conference have travelled from all over the world to be here, from the United States of America, Japan, Russia, Finland and other countries, many at great personal cost to themselves, to meet those with similar aims, to share and to benefit from new ideas to improve our work for you.

The conference is structured to provide a re-appraisal of our work and to facilitate discussion of major new technical developments. We are here to discuss and to learn what you, our users, want and how we can best meet your needs, to look at new automated cataloguing systems to widen public access to our collections, to learn from those colleagues who have begun to make audio-visual recordings of live performance and finally to review the work of SIBMAS to ensure it remains relevant in the 21st century.

We are delighted to be able to hold our conference in this beautiful and cultivated city particularly at such a memorable time for you. On behalf of the delegates here, I would like to offer our deepest thanks:

• to the City of Antwerp in the person of alderman Mr Gerard Bergers who has so kindly found the time to be here tonight despite his preoccupation with the commemoration of the liberation of Antwerp the same evening,
• to Mr Frans Redant, the director of this splendid theatre for his hospitality
• to the coordinator of the Bourla Theatre, Mr Raymond de Leenheir, for his exceptional help during a particularly busy period for him
• the Minister of Flemish Culture, Mr Hugo Weckx, who is unfortunately unable to be here tonight, who has given his support to the conference
• to Sony Belgium for lending us video equipment
• and especially to Roger Rennenberg, Director of the Library of the City of Antwerp and Curator of the Archives and Museum of Flemish Culture, who has made the time to organise this conference in addition to planning his new library.

To all of you and to the delegates who come from so far afield to be here, very many thanks.

20th Congress

URL: http://www.sibmas.org/congresses/sibmas94/antw_5.html

HOME
ACCUEIL

Rules
Statuts

Executive Committee
Comité exécutif

Institutional Members
Membres institutionnels

Joining SIBMAS
Adhérer à la SIBMAS

Exhibitions
Expositions

International Directory
Répertoire International

Conferences
Conférences

National Collections
Collections nationales

Research Sites
Sites pour la recherche

Partner Organisations
Organisations partenaires

Information about new membership:
Membership Secretary

Information about this site:
Webmaster

Renseignements sur l'inscription:
Secrétaire des associés

Renseignements sur ce site:
Webmaster

Last modified - Dernière mise-à-jour: 26/04/2005