Past Exhibitions at The New York Public Library for the Performing ArtsCurrent | Upcoming | Past | Online | Exhibition Hours | Calendar Search View Past Exhibitions at:
Search for a past exhibition. Katharine Hepburn: In Her Own Files  Katharine Hepburn’s elevation to the status of “icon” was due undoubtedly to her singular success on the screen. But her acting career began on the stage and it was there that she honed the skills that would later serve her so well in Hollywood. Yet even after her stature as a screen actress was solidified, she returned repeatedly to the stage, where each time she found new challenges, new audiences, new risks, and, more than once, failure. read more... Exhibition Brochure (PDF - 6 MB) Image: Katharine Hepburn in the title role of Jane Eyre, Theatre Guild tour, 1937. Photograph by Vandamm Studio. The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Billy Rose Theatre Division, Katharine Hepburn Papers New York Choral Society: The First 50 Years The New York Choral Society and The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts are celebrating the first 50 years of Choral Society history and the acquisition of the Choral Society's archive. One of the City’s most distinguished volunteer choruses, and proud of “New York” in its name, the Choral Society has performed in remarkable spaces here at home and abroad in a long list of cities that include Paris, Athens, Prague, Venice, Beijing and Shanghai. The Choral Society is celebrated for expanding the repertory through its commissions and premieres. Known for its Summer Sings and Mini-Maestro program for Public School students, the New York Choral Society is committed to expanding the audience and contributing to the City’s cultural vitality. Diaghilev's Theater of Marvels: The Ballets Russes and Its Aftermath Diaghilev's Theater of Marvels: The Ballets Russes and Its Aftermath, curated by dance historian Lynn Garafola, celebrates the legendary company that transformed 20th-century ballet and made it modern. Founded in 1909 by the Russian impresario extraordinaire Serge Diaghilev, the Ballets Russes taught audiences to hear, see, and respond to the art of the moving body in unprecedented ways. For the 20 years of its existence, a new repertory came into being—now-classic works like Michel Fokine's Les Sylphides and Petrouchka, Vaslav Nijinsky's L'Après-midi d'un Faune, and George Balanchine's Apollon Musagète and Prodigal Son—choreographed by artists whose talents Diaghilev was quick to discern and passionate to guide. He carried his quest for new expressive forms to music and design, commissioning scores from Igor Stravinsky, Sergei Prokofiev, Manuel de Falla, Erik Satie, Francis Poulenc, and Darius Milhaud, thus creating a new body of work both for ballet and for the concert hall. The list of his painters, headed by Pablo Picasso, Natalia Goncharova, and Henri Matisse, reads like a who's who of international modernism, underscoring the fact that Diaghilev's stage also served as a gallery of modern art. Spring Arrivals: Historic Debuts at SAB Workshop Performances  The School of American Ballet – official academy of New York City Ballet – has given spring Workshop Performances at Lincoln Center since 1965, dancing the works of George Balanchine, Peter Martins, Marius Petipa, and Jerome Robbins among others. Many of the students appearing in these annual performances have gone on to illustrious careers with major ballet companies. Dancers include Fernando Bujones, Darci Kistler, Maria Kowroski, and Ethan Stiefel and this exhibition – part of the School’s 75th Anniversary celebrations – chronicles their New York debuts with SAB. Renowned dance photographers Martha Swope and Paul Kolnik are among those represented in the exhibition. Image: Melinda Roy in her 1978 Workshop Performance. Photograph by Carolyn George. 40 Years of Firsts: Dance Theatre of Harlem In 1969, writing about Dance Theatre of Harlem, Clive Barnes, dance critic for The New York Times, began his article, “Black is beautiful, classic ballet is beautiful, so why are the two so rarely found together?” That changed when Arthur Mitchell, accomplished artistic director, astute educator, talented choreographer and extraordinary dancer, co-founded Dance Theatre of Harlem with his mentor, the renowned ballet teacher, the late Karel Shook. Inspired by the death of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Arthur Mitchell wanted to make a difference; by doing what he knew best, which was the focus and discipline of dance, he brought the art form of ballet to Harlem. The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts and Dance Theatre of Harlem are proud to collaborate on a multi-media exhibition that will bring these 40 years of art and accomplishment to Lincoln Center and then to museums and performance centers across the country. Curtain Call: Celebrating a Century of Women Designing for Live Performance  A collaboration with the League of Professional Theatre Women, this exhibition features works by 110 distinguished designers of scenery, costumes, lighting, props, and projections from various performing arts disciplines, including dance, theater, and opera, from the 1890s to the present. Including photographs, sketches, drawings, set models, costumes, performance videos, ground plans, and interviews with designers, augmented by public programs and educational workshops, it focuses on women designers as participants in the major artistic movements of the period, from experimental theater through the development of modern and, later, postmodern, dance. The exhibition also illuminates women’s roles in developing new technologies and materials for performance: for example, women took the lead in the new field of lighting design, from turn-of-the-19th-century experiments to the computerization of cues in the 20th century. The exhibition also investigates the connections among women designers and women-run businesses.
Image: Photograph of lighting designer Jean Rosenthal by her frequent collaborator, choreographer Jerome Robbins. Jerome Robbins Dance Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. Living Legacy: Portraits of NEA National Heritage Fellows, 1982 - 2008, photographed by Tom Pich  The National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellowships, initiated in 1982, are the federal government's highest form of recognition of folk and traditional artists for their contributions to our nation's living cultural heritage. NEA heritage fellows are nominated by the public and a panel of experts convened by the agency reviews these nominations using the criteria of artistic excellence, significance within an artistic tradition, and contributions to cultural heritage. On display here are portraits by Tom Pich, who, since 1991, has visited and photographed the Fellows in their living rooms, workshops and community settings. In 2007, the NEA developed an exhibition of photographs to mark the 25th anniversary of the program. Those images have been augmented with photographs selected to represent fellows in the performing arts and in the New York metropolitan area for the display at the New York Public Library for the Perofrming Arts. They include singers, musicians, instrument makers, dancers, puppet artists, basket makers, and weavers from a world of traditions and cultures. Image: Etta Baker, guitarist and 1991 National Heritage Fellow. Photograph by Tom Pich Divas! The Fabulous Photography of Kenn Duncan To celebrate the publication of Divas! The Fabulous Photography of Kenn Duncan, the Library presents a selection of Kenn Duncan’s photographs of celebrated women performers from the worlds of theater, ballet, and music, including Bette Midler, Angela Lansbury, Gelsey Kirkland, Suzanne Farrell, and Bernadette Peters. To purchase the publication of Divas! The Fabulous Photography of Kenn Duncan please click here "Take Me Out to the Ball Game": 100 Years of Music, Musicians, and the National Pastime  An exhibition for the whole family! To celebrate the 100th anniversary of baseball theme songs, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts presents a tribute to the sport and the musicians who love it, organized around the lyrics -- beginning with a history of the song and its creators. "Take me out with the crowd" focuses on composers who were fans and wrote about the game, among them Charles Ives and William Schuman. "Buy me some peanuts and Cracker Jack" looks at baseball and promotion via vaudeville and the musical stage, as well as trading cards. "Root for the Home Team" features baseball musicians, among them Jane Jarvis, long-time organist for the New York Mets, and vocalists of the national anthem. The exhibition is based on New York Public Library collections, but includes unique items from the private collection of Andy Strasberg. Image: Sheet music for "Take Me Out to the Ball Game," as published in 1908. The featured performer is Nora Bayes. Music Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts Focus on the '70s: The Fabulous Photography of Kenn Duncan In the 1970s and early 1980s world of photography, Kenn Duncan was a name to be reckoned with. Duncan was a principal photographer for the entertainment magazine After Dark and for Dance Magazine, which chronicled the world of dance and choreography. Photographs by Kenn Duncan also appeared in Vogue,Harper’s Bazaar,Life,Time, and Newsweek. In addition, he photographed a dozen Broadway shows, including Hair, Applause, The Elephant Man, and Sophisticated Ladies, and published three volumes of his own photographs: Red Shoes, Nudes, and More Nudes. This retrospective of his 20-year career includes his iconic images of Mikhail Baryshnikov, Angela Lansbury, Rudolf Nureyev, Bette Midler, and the cast of Hair, as well as selections from his nudes and his work with hundreds of celebrities. Duncan’s complete archive was acquired by the Library in 2003 and is part of the Billy Rose Theatre Division. The Paper Bag Players: 50 Years of Theater Art  This adventurous theater for children has been, from their earliest performances at The Living Theater in the sixties through their tours of the Middle East, Asia and the British Isles, to their current performances in New York City and across the United States, profoundly influential artistically and managerially—and has performed for more then five million children! Under the artistic direction of Judith Martin, the company creates a distinctly contemporary theater. Their shows vividly reflect the everyday lives of children. Their performance style is direct, humorous and friendly. Their sets, props and costumes made of brown paper bags, cardboard boxes and household objects. Their shows are a memorable, personal experience for their young audiences. The artistic endeavors of the company have been strongly supported by a dedicated administration. Under the guidance of Managing Director, Judith Liss, The Paper Bag Players have achieved a series of “firsts.” The Paper Bag Players were the first theatre for children to receive a grant from The National Endowment for Arts, to receive an OBIE, to perform at Lincoln Center and The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. This exhibit of photos, posters, historic documents, costumes and props, many drawn from the Paper Bag Players Archives, newly acquired by the Billy rose Theatre Division, the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. It celebrates the 50th Anniversary of The Paper Bag Players. One of the longest running theaters for children in America, they are still as new, lively and imaginative as the youngest member of their audience. New York Story: Jerome Robbins and His World  The most celebrated American choreographer of his time, Jerome Robbins belongs uniquely to New York. He was born in the city and died there, and his dances, both for Broadway and for the ballet stage, recounted its lore and the joys and travails of its ordinary folk. His dances touched a contemporary chord. They conveyed vernacular energies and communal pleasures, echoed the rhythms of jazz, and were set physically and psychologically in New York landscapes. New York Story: Jerome Robbins and His World explores Robbins's work in the context of the many, overlapping New York worlds that met in it. The exhibition draws principally on the very rich collections of Robbins material at the Library's Jerome Robbins Dance Division, as well as on material from other Library divisions, augmented by loans from the Museum of the City of New York, the Paley Center for Media, The Jerome Robbins Trust and Foundation, and private individuals. The exhibit has been curated by Lynn Garafola, professor of Dance at Barnard College. Exhibition Brochure (PDF) Image: Jerome Robbins. Photograph by Jesse Gerstein. Courtesy of the Jerome Robbins Foundation Writing to Character: Songwriters & the Tony Awards  For Broadway's lyricists, composers, and orchestrators, the Tony Awards represent the highest honor that their colleagues can bestow. The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts delves into its peerless collections for this multi-media tribute to the creators of the Best Musicals, as well as winners of the occasional Best Score Tony. Working backwards from the award ceremony, the exhibition reveals the work of putting on a show -- from the opening night performance back through rehearsals, orchestrations and arrangements, demos and money raising, writing the songs, and plotting out the show to the original concept. Material is drawn from the archives of songwriters and their producer, designer, director, and performer colleagues in the Library’s four research divisions, including, among many others, Richard Rodgers, Betty Comden and Adolph Green, Frank Loesser, Harold Prince, Michael Stewart, Jerry Bock and Sheldon Harnick, Fred Ebb, Charles Small, Edward Kleban, and the New York Shakespeare Festival. Image: The songwriters at the first rehearsal of Wonderful Town, 1953. (left to right) Betty Comden (lyricist), Rosalind Russell (star), Adolph Green (lyricist), George Abbott (director), Lehman Engel (musical director) and Leonard Bernstein (composer). Photograph by Vandamm. Billy Rose Theatre Collection, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts Benny Goodman: The Historic Carnegie Hall Concert January 16, 2008 marked the 70th anniversary of the historic concert at Carnegie Hall given by Benny Goodman and his Swing Orchestra. As it stated in the original concert promotion brochure: "Benny Goodman and his orchestra will give, under the pioneering auspices of S. Hurok, the first concert of swing music in the history of Carnegie Hall." The original concert announcement, programs record jackets and photographs will be on display through April 15th in the third floor reading room. In Their Company: Portraits of American Playwrights by Ken Collins  Plays tell stories, and photographs tell stories. The words of a play begin on the page and come alive in real time with real people. That relationship created between the people onstage and those in the audience is an intimate one. Photography, I feel, works the same way, though in the opposite direction—capturing real people in real time, the image on the page creates an intimate experience for the viewer. I am completely enchanted by the passion, intellect, and grace of the playwrights who welcomed me into their homes. As a photographer, I could not have asked for better subjects. They wear their lives and their choices on their faces. To become a playwright is a leap of faith, and while these artists have achieved so much, they maintain enormous humanity and humility. That’s what I wanted to capture, and why I chose to photograph them as people, not as “personalities.” I wanted to invite the viewer in, to recreate the sensation of close contact found in the theatre, and, as best I could, to tell each person’s story. – Ken Collins The 45 photographs on display are selected from In Their Company: Portraits of American Playwrights (Umbrage Editions, 2006). Quotations are excerpted from longer interviews, conducted by Victor Wishna, in that book. The playwrights represented here live in The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts through published scripts on the Circulating Drama Collection shelves (on the 2nd floor) and in archival materials in the research divisions on the 3rd floor. Image: August Wilson. Photograph by Ken Collins. Graziella Vigo captures Verdi on Stage  This exhibition features 130 images by the famed Italian fashion, portrait, and performance photographer, Graziella Vigo. At the suggestion of maestro Riccardo Muti, Vigo photographed productions of Verdi operas at the Teatro alla Scala, in Milan, and the Teatro Regio, in Parma. Ms. Vigo also photographed productions touring at Bunka Kaikan in Tokyo. The over-sized photographs, hand-printed on canvas, comprise strikingly dramatic images of Verdi's most popular operas: Aida, La traviata, Il trovatore, Rigoletto, Un ballo in maschera, Macbeth, and two productions each of Falstaff and Otello. Image: Photograph by Graziella Vigo of Andrea Rost in Verdi's La Traviata, Teatro alla Scala, 2001. Lincoln Kirstein: Alchemist  At his centennial, cultural institutions around New York City are celebrating writer, poet, and arts patron Lincoln Kirstein and his impact on American culture. Lincoln Kirstein: Alchemist focuses on the five dance companies he founded – the American Ballet, Ballet Caravan, American Ballet Caravan, Ballet Society, and the New York City Ballet. Each was, in its own way, experimental and pushed the edges of American culture and society. He brought choreographers together with young artists and composers, leading to masterpieces as different as Billy the Kid, Concerto Barocco, The Seasons, and Orpheus. Among the designers whose art is featured are Cecil Beaton, Aline Bernstein, Isamu Noguchi, Tchelitchew, and Ben Shahn, whose designs for the unproduced Tom are on display. The exhibition also recognizes Kirstein's role in the founding of the Library's Dance Collection, now the Jerome Robbins Dance Division. Exhibition Brochure (PDF) Image: Lincoln Kirstein. Portrait photograph by George Platt Lynes Gift of Marie-Jeanne, Jerome Robbins Dance Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts Copyright Estate of George Platt Lynes Men at Dance -- from Noh to Butoh  Men at Dance–from Noh to Butoh", a photography exhibition by Miro Ito, is a visual representation of the dichotomy that characterizes Japanese performing arts of the past and present. Ito’s 50 photographs focus on two distinct forms of Japanese dance – Noh and Butoh – capturing the intrinsic qualities of each form, establishing a unique relationship between them. Noh, a traditional dance form, began in the 14th Century, whereas Butoh is a modern form, characterized by a subversion of conventional notions of dance.
Image: Fumiyuki TAKEDA (of the Kanze school)as Arsumori in the Noh play Atsumori. Photograph by Miro Ito. Invention: Merce Cunningham & Collaborators  A collaborative project of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, the Cunningham Dance Foundation, and the John Cage Trust. Image: Merce Cunningham in his Antic Meet, 1958. Photograph by Richard Rutledge. Courtesy Archives of the Cunningham Dance Foundation. Cloud Gate in Photographs  This photographic exhibition honors the Taiwanese experimental dance company on its fifth appearance at the Brooklyn Academy of Music's Next Wave Festival. The images focus on major works by the innovative choreographer LIN Hwai-Min: Nine Songs, Songs of the Wanderers, Moon Water, and the trilogy Cursive. This program is presented in association with Asia Society and the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Image: Dancer CHOU Chang-ning in LIN Hwai-Min's Cursive, presented by Cloud Gate Dance Theatre. Photograph by LIU Chen-hsiang. Molly Picon: Yiddish Star, American Star  For years she was the "sweetheart" of New York’s Lower East Side Yiddish-speaking community. Her shows, her sheet music, her records, her films, her radio programs, won her a special place in their hearts. Then, as she increasingly began appearing in more English language shows, television programs, and films, an even larger audience fell in love with her: the American public. Picon's changing career reflects the contributions immigrant cultures have made to our entertainment industry, our city, and our nation.
Exhibition Brochure (PDF) Image: This photograph of Molly Picon was distributed by the William Morris Agency, ca. 1963. Billy Rose Theatre Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts The Performance of Self in Everyday Life: Photography by Dona Ann McAdams  The Performance of Self in Everyday Life: Photography by Dona Ann McAdams Image: Meredith Monk in her Volcano Songs at PS122, 1994. Photograph by Dona Ann McAdams. Arturo Toscanini: Homage to the Maestro  A 50TH ANNIVERSARY RETROSPECTIVE Image: Arturo Toscanini aboard the U.S.S. Rex, December 28, 1933. Toscanini Legacy Collection, Music Division. Stars and Treasures: 75 Years of Collecting Theatre  Since its founding in 1931, the Billy Rose Theatre Collection, a division of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, has amassed more than nine million items, which together constitute the world's preeminent record of live theater in all its manifestations. The collection's holdings are of such repute that researchers from every continent have availed themselves of its treasures and resources. This year marks the 75th anniversary of this world-renowned collection and The New York Public Library will commemorate the occasion with celebratory events throughout the year. The centerpiece of this anniversary celebration will be a major exhibition featuring hundreds of rare or unique treasures from the collection. The exhibition will consist of artifacts that, in most cases, have been viewed by only a few researchers on-site and, in many cases, have never before been seen by the public. Among the items featured in the exhibition will be costume jewelry worn by Edwin Booth in Hamlet, costume designs by Cecil Beaton for the original production of My Fair Lady, a bejeweled belt worn by Sarah Bernhardt in Cleopatra, letters written by Harry Houdini, heartbreaking letters from American playwright Tennessee Williams describing the burden of alcoholism and its effect upon his writing, and a color caricature by Al Hirschfeld portraying George Bernard Shaw as a red-faced, horned devil. Many contemporary actors have loaned their personal treasures for this exhibition. One among many is a silver smelling-salts vial once owned by actress Ellen Terry and now a prized possession of actress Jane Alexander. Exhibition Brochure (PDF - 4.5 MB) Image: Costume design by Gladys Monkhouse for a musical revue, probably Cheer Up (1917), presented at New York's Hippodrome Theatre. R. H. Burnside Collection, Billy Rose Theatre Division. In Character: Actors Acting  Each actor was given a direction, a character to play, a scene, and, at times, even dialogue. Photographs were made as each actor creatively developed the part. The results of these improvisations are revealed on the walls of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts in Howard Schatz's enthralling close-up photographs. Based on the 2006 book by Howard Schatz and Beverly J. Ornstein, this landmark project provides a fascinating new vision of actors acting and the power of creative imagination. Image: Edie Falco as photographed by Howard Schatz. © 2006 by Howard Schatz and Beverly J. Ornstein 500 Years of Italian Dance: Treasures from the Cia Fornaroli Collection  500 Years of Italian Dance: Treasures from the Cia Fornaroli Collection pays tribute both to the rich history of Italian dance and to the remarkable Cia Fornaroli Collection, a jewel of the Library's Jerome Robbins Dance Division. Assembled by Walter Toscanini, son of the famed Italian conductor, and his wife the La Scala ballerina Cia Fornaroli, the Collection documents the full sweep of Italian dance history from the Renaissance to the early twentieth century. The Collection is huge and multifaceted. It encompasses some of the earliest writings on dance, including one of the very first Renaissance dance manuals, scores of books, letters, programs, and libretti, and literally hundreds of designs, photographs, lithographs, and ephemera. It also includes Toscanini's personal research materials and manuscripts, as well as an important collection of memorabilia documenting the career of his ballerina-wife. Image: Sofia Fuoco dancing the Tarantella, [185-]. Engraving from Cia Fornaroli Collection, Jerome Robbins Dance Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. Dance in Cuba  In 2001 Gil Garcetti traveled to Cuba for the first of what would be several visits. Captivated by the essential role of dance in everyday life, he photographed dancers ranging from professional ballerinas to street performers. This, the first museum exhibition of Garcetti’s Cuban images, features fifty-nine photographs, most of which are drawn from his acclaimed new book, Dance in Cuba (2005). Image: Danza Contemporánea de Cuba, January 2004. Photograph by Gil Garcetti. From Color to Light: Beni Montresor  This multi-media exhibit on the international opera, ballet and theater career of designer Beni Montresor is a co-production of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, the Istituto Italiano di Cultura in New York, Fondazione Aida, and Titivillus Mostre Editoria. Montresor designed for scenery, costumes and lighting for an international array of the major opera houses, ballet troupes, and summer festivals, as well as Broadway and Off-Broadway theaters. The exhibit will feature photographs and original designs, costumes from Turandot, loaned by the New York City Opera, and the set model for the musical comedy Rags. From Color to Light is presented in conjunction with House of Flowers House of Stars,a concurrent exhibit on his career as an author and illustrator of children's books at the Istituto Italiano di Cultura. Image: Beni Montresor arriving in New York City. Fondazione Aida 60 Years of Tony Award® Excellence  The American Theatre Wing, The League of American Theatres and Producers, and The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts are proud to present the 60 Years of Tony Award Excellence exhibition at The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. The exhibition, which features the window cards from each one of the Tony Award Winning Best Plays and Musicals from the past 60 years, will officially kick-off the 2006 Tony Award® season. Show Business: Irving Berlin's Broadway  From interpolations to the integrated musical, Irving Berlin's story tells the evolution of the Broadway musical as an art form. through photographs, drawings, set and costume designs, programs, and related ephemera, we present moments from every part of his Broadway career, as he and his audience first saw it. The exhibition is a project of the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts that will also travel to the San Francisco Performing Arts Library & Museum (July - December 2005) and the Marion McNay Art Museum, San Antonio (July - October 2006). read more... Image: Irving Berlin (at piano), with (from left) Eddie Cantor, Florenz Ziegfeld, Jr., dance director Sammy Lee, and members of the chorus of the 1927 edition of the Follies. Billy Rose Theatre Collection Opera on the Air: The Metropolitan Opera Radio Broadcasts Turn 75  This multi-media exhibit documents the 75 years of live radio broadcasts of the Metropolitan Opera. It includes scores, correspondence, photographs and artifacts from the Music Division and Rodgers & Hammerstein Archives of Recorded Sound, as well as costume pieces on loan from Metropolitan Opera's Archives. Available with the exhibit is an audio station featuring selections from the broadcasts' performances and intermission features. Harlem is...Music  Harlem is...Music is a component of Community Works' signature multilayered public art exhibition developed with NYC public schools and after school programs. The exhibit explores Harlem's unrivaled musical tradition through archival and contemporary photographs, commentary by contributing writers and poetry and prose by Harlem public school students. It examines the development of 8 musical genres: Jazz, blues, R&B, hip-hop and rap, gospel, classical, Latin, and fusion. Image: The Minton's Playhouse PHOTO CREDIT: Copywright William P. Goittlieb, Library of Congress Collection PICTURED FROM LEFT TO RIGHT: Portrait of Thelonious Monk, Howard McGhee, Roy Eldridge, and Teddy Hill, Minton's Playhouse, New York, N.Y., ca. Sept. 1947 Vaudeville Nation  Vaudeville has been called the most influential entertainment genre in the nation's history. Vaudeville, and the related forms such as burlesque and prologs, provided freedom for self-expression of social and political commentary. It supported the development of America's two native art forms -- jazz and tap dance -- and served a model for radio, early sound film, and television. Unlike those media, it served the full diversity of the American public -- as performers and as audience. The research divisions of LPA, the Billy Rose Theatre Collection, Jerome Robbins Dance Division, Music Division and Rodgers & Hammerstein Archives of Recorded Sound, are the major source for vaudeville research. They document thousands of performers, promoters, tour managers, theater buildings, and the critics, composers, writers, dance directors, and designers who worked with them. The collections include the primary documents of vaudeville -- joke books, scripts, designs, and songs -- as well as promotional materials, such as photographs, illustrated letterheads, flyers, and calling cards, sent to turn-of-the-century critics. From Every Stage: Images of America's Roots Music  Bluegrass, folk, blues, zydeco, and cowboy country -- these genres are both America's roots and America's present. From Every Stage is a selection of photographs by noted journalist Stephanie P. Ledgin, revealing performances, practice and jam sessions. Among the performers are John Hartford, Odetta, Pete Seeger, Queen Ida, and Minnie Pearl in venues from the Grand Ole Opry to the Lincoln Center Out-of-Doors Festival. Image: Cajun band leader Steve Riley at the 1999 Crawfish Fest, Waterloo Village, Stanhope NJ. Photo by Stephanie P. Ledgin. The Juilliard School, 1905-2005: Celebrating 100 Years  A collaboration with The Juilliard School to celebrate the 100th birthday of the esteemed conservatory of dance, music, and theater. Exhibition Brochure (PDF) A Community of Artists: 50 Years of the Public Theater  In conjunction with the 50th Anniversary of the founding of the New York Shakespeare Festival and Public Theater I LA GALIGO: From the Sulawesi Epic to the Stage  An exhibition of photographs and texts documenting the Indonesian island cultural epic and Robert Wilson's production of I LA GALIGO at the Lincoln Center Festival, July 13 - 17, 2005. America's Irreplaceable Dance Treasures: The First 100  An exhibit developed by the Dance Heritage Coalition representing the first 100 American Dance Treasures, among them, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts read more... Image: Ruth St. Denis in her solo Tagore Poem, 1929. Photo by Soichi Sunami. The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Dance Division. Beyond the Rainbow: Music of Harold Arlen  A multi-media tribute to composer and songwriter Harold Arlen on the 100th anniversary of his birth. read more... Image: Harold Arlen singing. Courtesy of S. A. Music. DISCO: A Decade of Saturday Nights  interactive exhibit from Experience Music Project, Seattle, on the culture and music of the influential social dance genre read more... Image: Disco: A Decade of Saturday Nights. Experience Music Project Bedlam Days: The Early Plays of Charles Ludlam and The Ridiculous Theatrical Company  Photographs by Argentian filmmaker and artist Leandro Katz documenting seven early productions of Charles Ludlam and the Ridiculous Theatrical Company, 1968 - 1975. read more... Image: Charles Ludlam, photographed by Leandro Katz, 1971. World Music in Focus: An Exhibition Celebrating the 20th Anniversary of World Music Institute  In this multi-media exhibition, The World Music Institute (WMI) and The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts have collaborated to showcase WMI's 20-year history as this nation's leading presenter of traditional music and dance from around the world. Featured will be the images of Jack Vartoogian, Linda Vartoogian, and Ira Landgarten, three prominent photographers who have documented WMI concerts for many years. The exhibit will also introduce new audiences to a wide range of music from many cultures and regions through concert videos from the WMI archive; traditional instruments from around the world, on loan from the Metropolitan Museum of Art and The Newark Museum; and interactive kiosks with music samples. read more... Image: Ravi Shankar performing on a sitar at the Alice Tully 70th Birthday celebration, May 16, 1990. Photograph by Ira Landgarten. Copyright Ira Landgarten. Mirrors to the Past: Ancient Greece and Avant-garde America  American artists have long been moved by the august cultures of ancient Greece. Motivated by the enlightened minds that produced works of incomparable beauty and emotional resonance, they in turn forged new directions, discarded rules, and redefined their art forms. This multimedia exhibition, which draws on rare material housed in all four research divisions of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, focuses on the liberating force of archaic and classical Greece and the countless 20th-century American choreographers, theater artists, composers, visual artists, and designers it inspired. read more... Image: Isadora Duncan at the Parthenon theater, 1904. Jerome Robbins Dance Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. Image ID: WWM9916/ISADORA/0058VA Mexico Now: Contemporary Dance Posters and Mexico Now: Sounds of Mexico  At the end of the 1970s and during the 1980s, a new wave of Mexican choreographers and dancers could be seen in parks, plazas, streets, fountains, church atriums, and other public sites, finding new audiences and alternative performance spaces. The independent groups of contemporary dance, as they call themselves, include, among others, Antares, Asaltodiario, Barro Rojo, Cebra, and Contradanza. Their work is characterized by a search for new styles, forms, techniques, and themes to reflect the social, political, and economic climate of change in Mexico. Posters and photographs were donated by the companies to Americas Exchange Program for Dance for the Jerome Robbins Dance Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, as part of a continuing collaborative effort. Posters will be mounted in the Plaza corridor gallery; additional archival and multi-media artifacts will be on display in the Dance Division, on the third floor. In addition, Sounds of Mexico, an exhibition of artifacts and audio material, is on display in the Rodgers & Hammerstein Archives of Recorded Sound, on the third floor. These exhibitions are part of the city-wide Mexico Now Festival, a project of Arts International. Image: Mexico Now, a citywide festival of contemporary Mexican arts and culture, will present the work of over 100 Mexican filmmakers, architects, writers, dance, theater, music, and visual artists at 28 of New York City's leading arts venues in November 2004 . Mexico Now is a project of Arts International, the nation's only nonprofit organization solely devoted to international arts exchange. More information is available at www.mexiconowfestival.org. The City and The Theatre In tribute to Mary Henderson’s recently re-issued definitive history of theater in New York City, The City and the Theatre, this exhibit of photographs and architectural renderings follows The Great White Way from 41st Street up to 52nd Street in a fascinating look at the evolution of Broadway’s theater buildings from their beginnings to the present day. Among the many legendary buildings highlighted are the old Metropolitan Opera, the Belasco, the Empire, and the Alwin. On display are original architectural drawings by Anthony Dumas (1910s to 1930s) juxtaposed, in the cases of surviving theaters, with nighttime photographs by Christopher Frith of their current incarnations. Also on view are contemporary drawings by Stanley Stark of old theaters that have been integrated into new buildings, including the Gershwin, the Marquis, and the new Broadway theaters. Ademola Olugebefola at Lincoln Center Out-of-Doors  New York artist Ademola Olugebefola spends his Augusts at the free performances of the Lincoln Center Out-of-Doors Festival. This exhibit focuses on recent art inspired by his sketching at modern dance presentations by Donald Byrd/The Group (of their In a Different Light: Duke Ellington, August 16, 2000) and Monte/Brown Dance (August 17, 2001); and at jazz concerts by Abdullah Ibrahim and Mary Stallings (August 24, 2001) and The Mingus Big Band (August 23, 2002). Image: Ademola Olugebefola's impressions of the piano improvisations of Ibrahim Abdullah, August 24, 2001. Margot Fonteyn in America: A Celebration  Margot Fonteyn was probably the most famous, most successful, and most beloved ballerina in the second half of the 20th century. Her introduction to America came on October 9, 1949, when Sol Hurok presented the Sadler's Wells Ballet (later the Royal Ballet) at the Metropolitan Opera House, featuring Fonteyn in the role of Aurora in The Sleeping Beauty. This exhibition, which includes costumes, haute couture, photographs, and film, takes the audience from the pointe shoes Fonteyn wore on that opening night to a stage heaped with flowers at the curtain call for her final Aurora in the United States -- and beyond. read more... Exhibition Brochure (PDF - 3.1 MB) Image: Margot Fonteyn and Rudolf Nureyev in The Sleeping Beauty. Photograph by Mira. ... to illuminate the scene: Ellen Terry, Edith Craig, Edward Gordon Craig and John Gielgud  Four members of a British family redefined Anglo-American theater for the audience and profession. Ellen Terry, starring in the plays of Shakespeare and Shaw, epitomized the international appeal of English theater in the late 19th century. Her son, Edward Gordon Craig, was a revolutionary theorist, designer, and director of theater who also found the time to edit, design, and print books and magazines. Edith Craig, her daughter, first known as a designer and costumer, ran a theater company that produced suffragist and feminist plays, primarily by women. Terry’s great-nephew, Sir John Gielgud, presented and starred in both classics and innovative new plays of the British theater, and he created memorable characters in over fifty years of film. EKANBAN: Kabuki Billboards by Torii Kiyomitsu  This summer, the Lincoln Center Festival will present the Heisei Nakamura-za Kabuki Theater, Tokyo, led by Nakamura Kankuro V. Like Kabuki, Ekanban, the colorful billboards that advertise Kabuki plays, are also produced by a family dynasty. Torii Kiyomitsu is the ninth master of the Torii school, and the first woman in this traditional of tratrical painting. 30 large rice paper billboards depict the characters, costumes and repertory of Kabuki, including Natsumatsuri Naniwa Kagami, the work presented in the Festival. Image: Billboard by Torii Kiyomitsu for Natsumatsuri Naniwa Kagami The Enduring Legacy of George Balanchine  Active at every level of instruction and performance, George Balanchine nourished the performers, teachers, and students who shaped the future of ballet in New York and across the United States. In celebration of the centennial of Balanchine's birth and in recognition of his profound impact on New York City, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts will present this multimedia exhibition of photographs, designs, manuscript music and correspondence, costumes, set pieces, and models. Visitors will gain new insights from excerpts from oral histories of Balanchine dancers and from videotaped performances and rehearsals. Exhibition Brochure (PDF) Prokofiev and His Contemporaries: The Impact of Soviet Culture  This exhibition commemorates the 50th anniversary of Sergei Prokofiev's death by focusing on Soviet culture of the 1920s through 1940s and its impact on American performing arts. It is a project of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts and the MusicaRussia Foundation and features artifacts from the Library for the Performing Arts, the Glinka Archives and State Central Museum of Music, the Bolshoi Theater Museum, and the Stanislavsky and Nemerovich-Danchenko Theater of Moscow. Exhibition Brochure (PDF) Image: Photograph of Sergei Prokofiev, inscribed to Carl Lachmund, New York, 1920. Lachmund, a pianist, teacher and founder of the Women’s String Orchestra, had been a student of Franz Liszt. Carl Lachmund Collection, Music Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts Puppetry of Shadow and Light  The international art of shadow puppetry transcends time and geography. This exhibition presents artifacts and film honoring the ancient, traditional, and avant-garde forms of this vivid art. The exhibition features examples of traditional and modern puppets and screens from India, Indonesia, Cambodia, Thailand, Greece, Turkey, and Western Europe. It also includes figures, designs, and performance videos representing contemporary innovators Stephen Kaplin, Julie Taymor, Mabou Mines, Mireya Cueto, Larry Reed, Janie Geiser, and Theodora Skipitares, who have been influenced by shadow puppetry’s traditions. Image: Thai puppet figure from The Ramayana. Traditional Nang Yi Theater Style. Jo Humphrey Collection. Photographs by Sherif Sonbol An exhibit of images of contemporary Egyptian performance by photographer Sherif Sonbol. The photographs of ballet, modern dance, musicians, and street performance are intensively colorful and range from precise documentation to abstractions. The artist is the resident photographer for the National Cultural Center, the New Cairo Opera House, as well as El Ahram Weekly and Kalam el-Nas magazines. Original Cast Recordings  The exhibition documents the history of original cast recordings, the manner in which they are produced, and their role in preserving musical theater and spreading awareness of productions. Recordings from the Rodgers & Hammerstein Archives of Recorded Sound and circulating recorded sound collections are augmented by photographs, posters, and archival materials such as letters and recording contracts from the Billy Rose Theatre Collection and the Music Division. The exhibition features touch-screens that enable the audience to access over three hours of music recordings, as well as a gallery soundtrack of favorite overtures. Image: Oklahoma! cast album, 1943. Courtesy Decca Broadway. Centennial Salute to Al Hirschfeld The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts pays tribute to Al Hirschfeld and marks the 100th anniversary of his birth with Centennial Salute to Al Hirschfeld, a display of ten of the artist’s specially-commissioned works. Hirschfeld, whose singular drawings captured American theater for the greater part of a century, died in January of this year. In the early 1970s, he was given a commission to commemorate a series of Pulitzer Prize-winning plays. For each play, he drew a scene from the show and also created a collage with a portrait of the playwright and the cast pages from the original Playbill. All of the drawings included in the show are signed, and the scenes from the plays incorporate Hirschfeld’s signature Ninas. Vaslav Nijinsky: Creating a New Artistic Era  Vaslav Nijinsky (1890-1950) was one of the 20th century's preeminent artists. The exhibition focuses on his career as a dancer and choreographer in a time marked by international disruptions of war as well as avant-garde collaborations and artistic energy. read more... Image: Ballet Russes poster for a performance on April 19, 1911 in Monte Carlo. Colored lithograph by Jean Cocteau of Nijinsky in Fokine's Le Spectre de la Rose. The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Jerome Robbins Dance Division. Best of Times: The Theatre of Charles Dickens  Dickens's passion for the theater began in his childhood; his influence upon the theater continues today. Best of Times: The Theatre of Charles Dickens is illustrated with rare 19th-century broadsides, prints, posters, photographs, programs, and the original, annotated promptbooks used by Dickens during his vastly popular public readings. read more... Image: Poster depicting Martin Harvey as Syndey Carton in The Only Way, a stage adaptation of Charles Dickens's A Tale of Two Cities, 1899. Billy Rose Theatre Collection, NYPL. Theater.Ink: the Art of Sam Norkin  A retrospective of the art of Sam Norkin, cultural writer and caricaturist for the New York Herald-Tribune (1940 - 1956) and the NY daily News (1956 - 1980s), as well as many out-of-town papers and magazines. The exhibits includs Norkin's ink drawings of theater, dance, clasical music, opera, pop and jazz. A selection of his sketchbooks and preliminary sketches will also be shown Image: Self portrait by Sam Norkin. Children's Books in Performance  This family-friendly, multi-media exhibition focuses on children's and young adults' books that have been turned into theater, dance, opera, concert music, radio, film, and television. The section "Fairy Tales and Fables" highlights performances based on tales such as Hoffmann's The Nutcracker, Andersen's Little Mermaid, and the Grimm Brothers' Puss in Boots and Snow White, as well as several versions of Cinderella. read more... Image: Poster for the pantomime Puss in Boots, as produced by Augustus Harris at the Drury Lane, London,1897. Billy Rose Theatre Collection. Music by Richard Rodgers  The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts presents a major exhibition celebrating the composer and songwriter Richard Rodgers. The multimedia exhibit focuses on Rodgers' music for 45 complete professional theater works, 11 original films, and numerous radio and television productions, as well as ballets and symphonic scores. Through ambient sound and touch-screen audiostations, visitors will be able to hear commercial and noncommercial recordings of the scores and songs as performed on stage and as jazz standards. The exhibition is based on the Richard Rodgers collections in the Billy Rose Theatre Collection, the Music Division, and the Rodgers & Hammerstein Archives of Recorded Sound, as well as the archival collections of his collaborators. Capturing Nureyev: James Wyeth Paints the Dancer  Through paintings, photographs, and designs, Capturing Nureyev: James Wyeth Paints the Dancer provides a multifaceted view of Rudolf Nureyev, one of ballet's rare superstars. Over 35 paintings and drawings of Nureyev by his friend, American artist James Browning Wyeth, plus more than 61 photographs and designs from the Jerome Robbins Dance Division of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, and a sampling of Nureyev's costumes are on display. Image: Nureyev--Don Quixote--Yellow Background, 2001. Combined mediums on cardboard. Collection of the Artist. Making Music Theater: Kurt Weill and His Collaborators  No composer of the 20th century was committed more strongly to musical theater than Kurt Weill, and no composer worked in a wider variety of genres or with a wider variety of artists. The exhibition Making Music Theater: Kurt Weill and His Collaborators, at the renovated New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, opens a window onto the complex process of collaboration, the quintessence of musical theater. read more... Transformations: A Celebration of the Creative Spirit in the Performing Arts  To celebrate the reopening of its Lincoln Center home, now named the Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts presents Transformations, an exhibition on transformations inherent to the creative process. This first exhibition in the renovated Library will fill both redesigned galleries and features treasures drawn from the nine million objects in the Library's collections in music, dance, theater, and recorded sound. read more... Image: Magic is reality transformed, as seen in the Houdini poster for The Double Fold Death Defying Water Mystery (Russell-Morgan Lithographers, 1911). Touring West: 19th-century Performing Artists on the Overland Trails  Touring West, featuring materials from the research collections of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts and presented at the Library's flagship building on Fifth Avenue, focuses on the professional performances that toured the United States from the time of the Louisiana Purchase (1803) through the 19th century. read more... Exhibition Brochure (PDF - 1.5 MB) Image: Promotional brochure for James O'Neill's Monte Cristo tours. The Currier Lithography Co., Buffalo, [used 1882-85]. Players Collection, Billy Rose Theatre Collection The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts Encore: More Music for the Cinema An expanded version of the popular exhibition originally seen in the Music Division Reading Room, Encore: More Music for the Cinema uses a wide variety of materials from the Library's collections to give viewers a behind-the-scenes glimpse of how music is created for film. Contracts, correspondence, manuscript scores, and continuity drafts reveal the workaday world of the film composer, while posters, photo stills, and sheet music covers show the methods used to promote movies, their music, and the illusion of glamour. With Pen in Hand: An Exhibition of Theatrical Correspondence Manuscript correspondence from such luminaries as Eugene O'Neill, John Barrymore, Groucho Marx, George Bernard Shaw, and Tennessee Williams reveals the personalities, humor, and heartbreak behind some of the theatre's greatest talents. Ernesto Halffter: Life & Work of a Spanish Musician Ernesto Halffter, one of Spain's leading 20th-century composers, is best known for his Sinfonietta, premiered in 1927, which successfully combines various influences on Spanish composers of the period. The exhibition of letters, scores, manuscripts, photographs, and other materials draws primarily on the private collections of Halffter's son Manuel and comes to the Library from Spain, where it was organized by Granada's Fundación Archivo Manuel de Falla and Madrid's Residencia de Estudiantes. Runnin' Wild: The Collaborative Recordings of Benny Goodman and Teddy Wilson, 1935-1939 Clarinetist Benny Goodman and pianist Teddy Wilson were acclaimed for their mid-1930s collaborations in the Benny Goodman Trio and Quartet and the Teddy Wilson Orchestra. The exhibition features original recordings, photographs, press clippings, and record catalogs celebrating the artistic collaboration of two of the Swing Era's great performers. Ralph Lee: Masks, Festival Figures & Theatre Designs The monsters, animals, and other fanciful characters created by Ralph Lee have delighted audiences of his Mettawee Theatre Company and the annual Greenwich Village Halloween Parade, which the artist founded in 1974. The exhibition includes a wide range of Lee's figures, as well as masks, costumes, and props he has constructed for his works and those of others. A Son Comes Home: Ademola Olugebefola Responding to Dance Ademola Olugebefola's dance illustrations, such as the one reproduced on the cover of this brochure, are deceptive in their simplicity. With delicate line and expressive form, his works capture the movement and emotion of the compelling performances that inspired his creations. Who Are They?: Unknown Iconography in the Music Division  Can you identify the spaghetti-eating saxophonist, the peppy pop singers, or the pouting Pagliacci? Amid the vast collections of photographs, prints, and drawings in the Library's Music Division are many that are unidentified. These images have stumped our staff. Can you tell us who they are? Syvilla Fort: Through the Lens of Carmine Schiavone Syvilla Fort was an influential dancer, choreographer, and teacher. Carmine Schiavone's photographs of her document the Experimental Dance Group and her school. Four thematic groups--Ritual, Worship, Marriage, and Myth--show her explorations in what she termed Afro-Modern Dance. Pink Cadillacs and Yellow Submarines: Transportation in a Century of Popular Music Recordings Take a bus, a subway, or a taxi (and then an elevator) to the Rodgers &Hammerstein Archives of Recorded Sound, where such recordings as "The Magic Bus," "Leaving on a Jet Plane," and "Take the A Train" illustrate transportation as reflected in a hundred years of popular recordings. Risks & Rewards: Commissioned Works of American Ballet Theatre  The Library's unique archives of choreographic notes, original manuscripts, scores, and stage designs will show the development of ballet masterpieces created for ABT, such as Jerome Robbins's Fancy Free, Agnes de Mille's Fall River Legend, Antony Tudor's Pillar of Fire, and George Balanchine's Theme and Variations. The exhibit also focuses on the Ballet Theatre Workshop, and more recent commissions by company members and modern dance choreographers. Image: Hugh Laing and Nora Kaye in choreographer Antony Tudor's Pillar of Fire, 1942. The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts/Dance Collection. Rouben Ter-Arutunian: A Working Collection The verdant forest that transforms into an art nouveau ballroom in George Balanchine's ballet Vienna Waltzes, and the vivid, magical settings for the choreographer's Nutcracker, are among the renderings and models on view in this selection of designs that redefines Ter-Arutunian's range. The exhibit showcases his pioneering work in television design in the 1950s and in open-air and televised opera, as well as his better-known designs for Broadway and the ballet stage. Swing The swinging sounds of big bands led by Glenn Miller, Benny Goodman, Tommy Dorsey, Duke Ellington, Woody Herman, and others defined popular culture in the 1940s. With such material as original arrangements used by Goodman and Dorsey; numerous commercial, off-air, and private recordings; programs and menus from popular nightclubs; and other memorabilia, the exhibition recalls the music that provided the soundtrack for a youthful generation as it asserted its independence and contended with war. Carmine Schiavone and Dance Carmine Schiavone's striking fashion photography graced the covers of such magazines as Cosmopolitan, Harper's Bazaar, and Seventeen. The exhibition showcases his photographs of such important dancers and choreographers as José Limón, Talley Beatty, Donald McKayle, and Katherine Dunham. Music for the Cinema With materials from the collections of the Library's Music Division, the exhibition explores the history of film music. Among the items included are manuscripts of scores by Louis Gruenberg, George Antheil, and Aaron Copland. Lincoln Kirstein: Collector Lincoln Kirstein's gifts to the world were the New York City Ballet and School of American Ballet, which he created with George Balanchine. Kirstein was also a great collector, and early in the history of the Dance Collection gave the Library a wealth of rare dance materials. Before his death in 1996, he donated all his papers, artworks, and other materials related to the history of dance and his life in the arts. This exhibition provides a first glimpse at the important treasures in the Kirstein collection that will be available to inform future generations pursuing knowledge of dance. Cotillion to Cakewalk: Social Dance Prints The manners, personalities, and dance steps of the private ballroom and public club are illustrated in a series of vivid prints spanning the past 50 years. A recent gift of prints from the estate of Josephine Butler, a noted teacher of social dances, joins other examples from the Dance Collection. Musica Popular/Misique Popilè/Popular Music of the Caribbean Rumba, Meringue, Reggae, Ska! Throughout this century, New Yorkers have performed, listened, and danced to the beats of Puerto Rican, Dominican, Cuban, Jamaican, Haitian, and other Caribbean musical forms. The exhibition looks at the development and continuing influence of Afro-Caribbean and indigenous rhythms, instruments, and vocal styles. New York in Sound: Recordings Celebrating the City's Last Century This exhibit features recordings of music about New York City or made in New York City, sounds of the city, and public personalities reflecting life and culture in the Big Apple. Included are such songs as "The Sheikh of Avenue B," "He's a Latin from Staten Island," and "Harlem on My Mind," as well as recordings like The Sound of New York: A Music-Sound Portrait, and Nueva New York: A Tape Documentary of Puerto Rican New Yorkers. Alternative Rocks David Bowie, Lou Reed, The Sex Pistols, Bob Marley, Tribe 8, Joan Jett, The Talking Heads, and Nirvana are just a few of the bands and artists that took rock and roll in a multitude of innovative directions from its early rhythm and blues-based incarnations. The exhibition uses materials from the Library's collections to explore the "alternative" artists who, even today, push rock toward new horizons. Henry Cowell: A Centennial Celebration The exhibition focuses on the extraordinary life of Henry Cowell, visionary composer, teacher, and theorist. Archival material from the Music Division's Henry Cowell Collection of manuscripts, photographs, and personal memorabilia illuminate his seminal contributions to the shaping of 20th-century American music. The New Baroque: Early Dance Re-creations and Inspirations  Twentieth-century encounters with Baroque dance and music have been made possible by gifted historians who show the results of their research in performance. This exhibition features prints and illustrations of 17th- and 18th-century dance, as well as documentation of contemporary works by such groups as the New York Baroque Dance Company, which is celebrating its 20th anniversary. Image: Costume design for Reine des Sylphes in Le Balet des Elémens, 1763, by Jean-Baptiste Martin. From The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Dance Collection. Jo Mielziner: Scenic Poet of the Theatre Stage designer Mielziner brought a striking, stylized realism to Broadway, creating the settings for such productions as Tennessee Williams's Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman. In aesthetics and technical accomplishment, his influence on stage design is still greatly felt. The exhibition will feature original sketches, renderings, and plans, as well as correspondence with his many renowned collaborators. The Necessity of Rainbows: Lyrics by Yip Harburg From soulful ballads to biting satire, Yip Harburg wrote the lyrics for many of America's most haunting popular and theatrical songs. His contributions to American culture include lyrics for such standards as "Brother Can You Spare a Dime," "It's Only a Paper Moon," and "April in Paris," as well as the classic songs from the film The Wizard of Oz and the Broadway musical Finian's Rainbow. The exhibition traces Harburg's rise from the Lower East Side to Broadway and Hollywood, and his career-long commitment to the expression of social concerns in his art. The Hiram Stead Collection An avid theatregoer and devoted traveler, Hiram Stead trekked across Europe in search of theatre and theatre memorabilia. In the early 1930s, the Library acquired Stead's collection, which includes materials dating from the early 18th century to the early 20th century. The exhibit features highlights from the enormous variety of items in the collection, including broadsides, correspondence, iconography, toy theatres, and rarities such as an invitation to the coronation of George IV. Gimme a Pigfoot (and a Bottle of Beer): Gustation and Libation in Recorded Popular Song The exhibition features recordings and visuals, both singing the praises of glorious consumption and lamenting the woes of gluttony. The audio portion includes works by artists such as Bessie Smith, Johnny Paycheck, Louis Prima, and Tom Waits, to name a few. This is a serious and silly examination of the prevalence of these subjects in our popular culture. The Dance Heroes of José Limón José Limón carried forward and expanded the American modern dance tradition. With his own company he created such masterpieces as The Moor's Pavane and also kept alive in repertory the works of his mentor Doris Humphrey and other influential choreographers. Coinciding with the 50th anniversary of the José Limón Dance Company, the exhibition features correspondence between Limón and his collaborators, films and videos of his dances, posters, choreographic notebooks, and original costumes. The League/International Society for Contemporary Music--Then and Now The League of Composers and the U.S. Section of the International Society for Contemporary Music, both founded in 1923, have been vital forces in the promotion of contemporary music in America. With documents from the Library's Music Division, this exhibit traces the history of the League/ISCM (the groups combined in 1954) and showcases the work of George Perle, the composer honored by the society this year. Inside and Out: The Costumes of Barbara Matera, Ltd. As New York's leading costume shop, Barbara Matera, Ltd. has constructed wardrobe for everything from La Cage aux Folles (Broadway) to Les Petits Riens (New York City Ballet). The exhibition demonstrates the transformation from concept to costume by showing the various stages of construction of an elaborate Norma Desmond outfit from Broadway's Sunset Boulevard. Also featured are a wide range of other costumes, original designs, working drawings, catalogues, and swatch books, as well as industrial sewing machines and other equipment from the Matera shop. Léonide Massine: Symphonic Choreographer As chief choreographer and star dancer of Ballets Russes, Léonide Massine is remembered for his astute comedy and burning intensity in such ballets as Gaîté Parisienne and The Three-Cornered Hat. With companies now regularly reviving his works, Massine is being recognized as a major force in 20th-century modernism. The exhibition includes photographs and designs representing landmarks of his career. Play It Again Sam: Popular Songs on the Silver Screen This exhibition explores original and re-recorded popular songs that were used in films. It illustrates how popular songs can have several different lives as a result of their placement in various media. On display are record jackets, books, periodicals, and a selection of audio materials to aid visitors in comparing different versions. Puppets & Performing Objects Throughout the 20th century, artists from many disciplines and backgrounds have explored the use of objects in performance. While puppetry and mask performances are at the center of the form, this exhibition also focuses on techniques that might seem beyond the traditions of puppetry. Included in Puppets & Performing Objects are works by Alexandra Exter, Bil Baird, Bread and Puppet Theatre, Mabou Mines, Pablo Picasso, and others. Presented in conjunction with the Jim Henson Foundation as part of the Third International Festival of Puppet Theater. Meredith Monk: Archeology of an Artist As a composer, choreographer, singer, director, and filmmaker, Meredith Monk has built a body of work that cuts across many genres, and has established herself as a major creative force in the performing arts. The Library's exhibition explored the full evolution of Monk's pioneering performance works, from her earliest pieces to her latest stagings. In addition to photographs, posters, programs, films, recordings, and designs documenting such performances as 16mm Earrings, Juice, Education of the Girlchild, and Quarry, the exhibition featured scores of artifacts from Monk's productions, including the headdresses worn in Education of the Girlchild, X-ray boxes from Quarry, costumes and storyboards from Atlas, and a wall of shoes from various productions. Viva Verdi The life and work of composer Giuseppe Verdi were examined in this exhibition, which coincided with the continuing Viva Verdi Festival in Central Park, a series of 28 Verdi operas presented over seven summers by Vincent La Selva's New York Grand Opera Company. Curated by Mary Jane Phillips Matz, author of a highly acclaimed biography of the composer, the exhibition focused on the four operas presented in the 1996 festival, Alzira, Attila, Macbeth, and I Masnadieri. Included were original scores, librettos, engravings, and programs from the Library's collections, as well as materials from the personal collection of the curator. Drawn to the Theatre Theatrical caricatures and illustrations are usually created to help promote a production or accompany a published article. Yet, throughout the last century, such works have provided unique documentation of theatrical productions, and often convey the life and movement of the theatre more effectively than other media. In addition to original drawings, rare posters, handbills, photographs, scrapbooks, and letters, this exhibition showed the process of creating an illustration from the earliest concept sketches to the finished piece as it was published. On view in Drawn to the Theatre were the well-known creations of artists from the turn of the century to the present: Nell Brinkley, Paul Davis, Al Frueh, Alex Gard, Al Hirschfeld, James McMullan, Ben Solowey, and many others. Poetry and Dance  In collaboration with the Poetry Society of America, the Library's Dance Collection presented this exhibition focusing on choreography inspired by poetry, and works of verse which reflect images of dance and particular dancers. Among the dances highlighted were Vaslav Nijinsky's Afternoon of a Faun and Jerome Robbins's Afternoon of a Faun, both based on the poem by Stéphane Mallarmé, Doris Humphrey's Lament for Ignacio Sanchez Mejías, inspired by Federico García Lorca's poem, and Martha Graham's Letter to the World, based on the poem by Emily Dickinson. These productions were documented with photographs and other materials from the Dance Collection. The exhibition, presented in tribute to Lincoln Kirstein, was part of the Library's Poetry and Dance Festival. Image: Baron Adolf de Meyer. Photograph of Nijinsky as the Faun in L’Après-midi d’un Faune, Paris, 1911. Roger Pryor Dodge Collection, Jerome Robbins Dance Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts Voices of Spain Presented in conjunction with the Library's Music and Dance of Spain performance series, the exhibition featured recorded Spanish music, plays, and poetry from the collections of the Rodgers & Hammerstein Archives, with particular focus on the works of composer Manuel de Falla in recognition of the 50th anniversary of his death. In addition to displays of record jackets, books, and periodicals, the exhibit featured a selection of audio materials which visitors could enjoy on headphones. Joseph Schillinger's World of Tomorrow Joseph Schillinger's System of Music Composition combined the principles of science, mathematics, and the arts into a unique method of writing music. The exhibit contained examples of his own compositions, charts based on his system, as well as original correspondence with students, colleagues, and collaborators. Metal Earth Wood Styrofoam = Music Beyond traditional instruments lies the realm of music-making devices designed and built by composers and musicians themselves. Whether constructed from beautifully crafted ceramics or from styrofoam and string, these instruments open up new possibilities for the creation of sound. Metal Earth Wood Styrofoam = Music featured instruments used in the innovative ensembles of composers Skip LaPlante/Music for Handmade Instruments, Raphael Mostel/Tibetan Singing Bowl Ensemble, and Tan Dun/Earthsounds Ceramic Orchestra designed by Ragner Naess, as well as instruments of the late Harry Partch used by Dean Drummond/New Band. Manuscript scores, performance photographs, and audio-visual materials were also on display. Roll Over Beethoven First edition sheet music by The Beatles and Bob Dylan, and original lead sheets to such rhythm and blues hits as "Stand by Me" and "The Twist," were among the objects on view in this exhibition, which explored the origins of rock and roll in blues and boogie woogie, the instruments used to create its unique sound, the performers who defined the genre, and the means by which the music is promoted and disseminated. 1995 Centennial Exhibition: Ten Decades  In celebration of the Library's Centennial and the 30th anniversary of the move of the Library for the Performing Arts to Lincoln Center, this multimedia exhibition documented the significant developments in the performing arts in each of the decades between 1895 and 1995. The exhibition considered mainstream art forms such as vaudeville and movie musicals, alternative art forms such as modern dance and performance art, and forms of dissemination such as sheet music, radio, and LPs. Treasures from the Library's collections on view included an 1897 film clip of dancer Annabelle Whitford, produced by Thomas Edison's company; designs by Jo Mielziner for the original production of Death of a Salesman; Agnes de Mille's notes on transferring the dream ballet in Oklahoma! from stage to screen; photos and posters of modern dance giants Doris Humphrey, Charles Weidman, and Martha Graham; music by John Cage; and a teenaged fan's scrapbook of Beatles clippings. Image: Annabelle Whitford |