Waiting in the Wings: Review, Reflect, Respond
For APAC’s 2021 Study Day, we reflected on the events of 2020 and explored how some of our members are preparing for the future. It was inspiring to hear what APAC’s members have been able to achieve under difficult circumstances. Our members have responded really creatively to the events of 2020, and there’s a really positive attitude towards change and doing things better. Seven speakers joined us for a diverse range of talks, summaries of which are given below.
Alice Bloom, Wimbledon College of Arts: Challenges and opportunities of supporting performance students online
Alice is an Academic Support Librarian at Wimbledon College of Arts and has worked there for 13 years. In 2019, the College welcomed students onto new courses in Acting and Performance and Contemporary Performance. With the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, new challenges and opportunities occurred in making sure the students were properly supported.
Challenges included:
- A lack of group study space
- No browsing of library shelves, which is how many students like to find suitable learning resources
- Online teaching and ensuring engagement with the lesson when you feel as if you are “teaching into the silence”
Opportunities included:
- An increased uptake of 1:1s with students, offering tailored support
- The college has invested heavily in online resources and there is a higher awareness of them amongst students
- Offering a range of ways for students to engage with lessons, such as interactive whiteboards and group chats, especially for students who might lack the confidence to speak up in a large group
Louise Manico, Early Dance Circle: The Early Dance Circle’s Shift to Digital in Response to Covid-19
Louise is an Early Dance Circle (EDC) Committee Member and a Public Relations Specialist. During the past year and a half, she has led on organising online events for EDC’s members. The EDC promotes the performance, enjoyment and study of early dance and is an umbrella organisation for many historical dance groups. Due to the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, many groups were unable to meet up and dance together (and dancing together online had not proved particularly successful!). The EDC also had to move its regular events and talks online. Events that were moved online included the launch of a book about Ignatius Sancho, a talk by Professor Margaret McGowan and the EDC’s 2020 Festival. The EDC found YouTube and Facebook live particularly useful for streaming online talks.
There were a number of benefits to moving events online. This included record attendance at events,
with speakers and attendees joining from all over the world, and new non-members joining events for the first time. EDC has also been able to create a digital archive of events so they can be relived in the future.
Louise gave some tips on how to bring interactive, physical experiences to virtual forms of communication. This included running a hat competition as part of the 2020 Festival, organising a slide show to help members reminisce about past events, and encouraging members to learn simple dance steps during the “daft days” (as they are sometimes known) between Christmas and New Year. These informal, light-hearted elements added a lot of fun and made events more varied.
It wasn’t all plain sailing – one talk in particular experienced a number of technical issues and it was difficult to hear the speaker. Fortunately, the team was able to run a follow-up Q&A and circulate a transcript to the attendees, so people didn’t miss out. Louise stressed the importance of having several people on had to help at a virtual event, especially to deal with technical issues – these events can’t easily be run by just one or two people. She also stressed the importance of supporting members who were less confident with technology, to make sure they didn’t miss out, by logging on to events 30 minutes early to offer extra support.
Clare Wood, Southbank Centre: Keeping Connected: Southbank Centre Archive and the Art by Post project
Clare Wood is the Archivist at the Southbank Centre. With her Creative Learning colleagues, Clare has been involved in the Centre’s “Art by Post” project which aims to tackle loneliness and isolation. This project involved creating activity packs which each focussed on a different art form (such as music, poetry or dance). The activities in the packs could all be done with minimal resources. They were distributed to 4,500 individuals aged between 7 and 103 years by the National Academy for Social Prescribing, with support from regional partners including artsdepot, HOME and Age UK. Around 600 artworks created by participants have now been returned to the Southbank Centre.
The project benefited from good forward planning and a strong relationship between the Archive and Creative Learning teams. Because there was a plan to record the project from the start, the returned artworks have already been listed and digitised, and this will help with the smooth creation of an online exhibition of the artworks and ultimate transfer to the archive.
There have been a number of positive unexpected outcomes. The desire to create an online exhibition of the artworks has resulted in an improved online presence for the archive, with new gallery templates now at the archive’s disposal for future projects. The success of the project will also feed into the archive and creative learning programming going forwards. For example, Clare is investigating remote volunteering opportunities for some of the art by post recipients, and a monthly Connection Café at the Royal Festival Hall to tackle loneliness, with a memory and heritage focus for some of the sessions. The project has also helped to sustain and show the value of the archive during a period of time when it could not open to the public, and archives staff were on furlough.
The project has received really positive press coverage and this week a touring exhibition of the art works has been announced.
Paul Roberts, Royal Central School of Speech and Drama/Association of British Theatre Technicians: An Archive in the Making: 60 years of the Association of British Theatre Technicians
Paul is a Volunteer Archivist for the Association of British Theatre Technicians (ABTT) and a part-time PhD candidate at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, researching the professionalisation
of technical practice in post-war Britain. The ABTT was established to advance the professionalisation of theatre design and technical theatre, and in January 2021 the organisation celebrated its 60th anniversary. This seemed like an ideal time to celebrate the history of the ABTT by looking through its archive and sharing interviews and other aspects of the organisation’s history with its members.
Paul used the ABTT archive as an example of how difficult it can be to sustain a small archive at a small organisation, but one that is nonetheless very important, especially at a crucial point in the ABTT’s history. The ABTT archive, located in the ABTT’s private office, has been diligently cared for over a number of years by committed volunteers. It is well sorted, but not yet catalogued and there are no formal policies relating to its management. The ABTT library is held separately at the offices of Theatres Trust. This disjointed approach has made it difficult for the ABTT to develop a cohesive narrative of its own history.
The onset of the Covid-19 pandemic has started a period of reflection for Paul and his ABTT colleagues as they begin to consider the future of the archive. This includes appraising the material and deciding what needs to be kept. There is a concern that issues such as limited time and the size of material will become the appraisal criteria, rather than the value the items bring in understanding the history of the ABTT.
The past year and anniversary celebrations have made it clear that advocating for the ABTT requires an understanding of its history as a way to show the increasing professionalism of ABTT’s members. This shows the critical need for an archive in an organisation such as the ABTT.
Lucy Powell, University of Bristol Theatre Collection: Theatre and live art records at risk: survey, emergency response and capacity building at the University of Bristol Theatre Collection
Lucy is Keeper: Theatre Archives (job-share) at the University of Bristol Theatre Collection. In 2020, the Theatre Collection had noticed a dramatic increase in the number of collections being offered, due to the impact of Covid-19 on theatre and live art practitioners. As a result, they decided to apply to The National Archives’s Covid-19 Archives Fund to proactively identify and process theatre and live art records at risk. A proactive approach was needed for the most vulnerable records, those which were not being referred to the Theatre Collection and whose location and even existence was unknown to the record-keeping community. The application to The National Archives was successful and will fund a six month Archivist post to help identify and process the collections.
The Theatre Collection is aware of a number of ethical considerations around the project, and will be working closely with the University’s ethics committee and decolonising agenda to make sure it is done properly. This will include work to address unconscious bias, speaking to under-represented audiences, and ensuring staff can respond appropriately in sensitive situations such as when an organisation is winding down. Whilst the project aims to broaden the range of collections accepted into the Theatre Collection, the team assessing potential acquisitions also needs to be sensitive to alternative suitable homes for the material if that seems more appropriate.
Lucy gave an overview of what the project will entail:
Survey planning and discussions
Making contact with selected organisations and individuals with collections at risk, and identifying records either on location or remotely
Continuing to work with theatre and live art collections at risk, liaising with other collecting institutions, and selecting collections for accessioning.
- Delivery, checking, re-boxing and shelving of collections
- Completing Object Entry forms and accessioning
- Preparing for ingest to RDSF / Digital Archive Management System
- Website administration and content writing
- Strategy development and practical guidance
- Sharing information with the archive community and wider sector
Lucy is keen to get APAC members’ input. If you are aware of any theatre or live art archives at risk, please contact the Theatre Collection on theatre-collection@bristol.ac.uk.
Ian Abbott, Hip Hop Dance Almanac: The (mis)adventures of Ian Abbott and his attempts to build an archive of Hip Hop dance from scratch
Ian is an independent producer, writer, programmer and consultant who specialises in producing, strategic partnerships and product development in the creative and cultural industries in the UK and Asia. As a performing arts researcher he is interested in the history, archives and presentation (on stages and alternative spaces) of British Hip Hop theatre, British Hip Hop dance theatre and British Hip Hop dance. Starting from a place of dissatisfaction about how the mainstream media writes about and misrepresents Hip Hop dance in Britain, Ian created the Hip Hop Dance Almanac (HHDA) in 2018 as a way to archive some of the stories and voices of Hip Hop dance. A lack of knowledge about Hip Hop Dance formats amongst dance critics and other writers, means that the work often gets a critical pass and doesn’t receive the same level of attention as other dance forms.
The Hip Hop Dance Almanac is an archive of interviews with contemporary Hip Hop voices, which have been transcribed and made freely available online. The interviews allow for a more in-depth discussion of Hip Hop, including areas not covered by the mainstream media. To ensure these voices are heard, Ian has worked with universities where Dance is studied to make sure the HHDA is included on reading lists.
In the next stage of development for the HHDA, Ian plans to address the imbalance and misrepresentation of the culture on a much larger scale, by commissioning longform written content to create deep-dives on specific topics and perspectives on Hip Hop dance that people cannot find anywhere else. Contributors do not need to be writers or dancers, so long as they have an interesting perspective to offer, and new voices are encouraged. The deadline to submit pitches recently closed, and Ian will make all the newly commissioned content available on the website.
Hannah Jones, The National Archives Re-opening your archive service: strategies and scenarios
Hannah has worked as Sector Development Manager at The National Archives (TNA) since 2017, with particular responsibility for the Arts and the Eastern region. She has worked closely with archive services of all sizes throughout the pandemic, monitoring sector trends, and developing strategies and solutions to help services continue to serve their audiences and communities. Hannah gave an overview of the guidance which is available from TNA on how to reopen your archive service safely
and inclusively. However, she stressed that the guidance is frequently changing, so you should always check for the latest information on TNA’s website, as well as the latest government guidance for your region.
https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/archives-sector/our-archives-sector-role/coronavirus-update
Hannah pointed attendees to a recording of a webinar on how TNA has reopened its reading rooms (as of May 2021), although she stressed that this large scale approach might not be suitable for everyone.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9v1Ddoa-G8
In smaller organisations which cannot reopen so easily, you might want to consider the following:
- Using spare meeting rooms to provide access to items if your existing reading room/office space is too small to allow social distancing
- Having more in-depth conversations with researchers to narrow down their research to a few specific items, meaning they have a quicker visit
- Temporarily restricting access to certain items (eg. oversize items)
- Allowing less supervision of certain, low-risk items, if this seems appropriate
Hannah also discussed two scenarios relating to how we can reopen inclusively. The first scenario related to creating a one-way system in your building. Key considerations for this are:
- Is the route clearly signposted and easily navigable?
- Do you need seating or resting places?
- What height are your notices at?
- How are you catering for patrons with visual impairments?
The second scenario related to online booking and document pre-ordering. Although this is an effective way of managing bookings, it assumes that everyone has digital access and familiarity with online booking systems. It is important to consider what alternatives you can offer to patrons who cannot use this technology.
Gallery
What connects our members’ collections? Here we put a spotlight on some of the curious themes that tie us together.