Digital Representations of Performing Arts

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Digital Representations of Performing Arts

• AHDS Performing Arts HATII,
• University of Glasgow
• http//www.ahds.ac.uk/performingarts/
• http//www.hatii.arts.gla.ac.uk/
• eScience Institute
• http//www.nesc.ac.uk/esi/

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Overview and Objectives

• A theoretical framework for examining digital
  representations of performance
• Current state of digital representations for
  performance in the UK HE community.
• Understanding the challenges of representation

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• A work of art born on the stage lives only for a
  moment, and no matter how beautiful it may be it
  cannot be commanded to stay with us.
• (Stanislavski, My Life in Art, 1948)

Performance is ephemeral. It is studied through
representations, or evidence.
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Stages of performance

• Pre-text ( ? subtext)
• Process
• Performance Text
• Post-text
• Context ( ? subtext)

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From Five Centuries of Scottish
Music (http//www.ahds.ac.uk/performingarts/collec
tions/five-centuries.htm)
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From Stagework (http//www.stagework.org)
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From Designing Shakespeare (http//www.ahds.ac.u
k/performingarts/collections/designing-shakespeare
.htm)
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Two reviews from the Times Digital Archive
(accessed through http//infotrac.galegroup.com)
and Financial Times http//www.ft.com
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(No Transcript)
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A framework for digital representations of
performances
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Examples of digital representations
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Existing digital resource provision in the UK
(see AHDS Performing Arts Scoping Study
http//www.ahds.ac.uk/performingarts/pubs/scoping-
study-2006.pdf )
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Desired digital resources
Most sought-after types of digital resource
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Overview

• The characteristics of digital collections affect
  the methodology of study of those collections.
• Many existing digital resources provide
  contextual evidence and are suitable only for a
  material or historical theoretical model of
  study.
• Digital resources for which there is a
  particularly high demand
• Evidence of the performance text
• Materials documenting the creative process
• Resources which encourage a semiotic/textual or
  subjective analysis of the evidence.

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As if it wasnt complicated enough

• http//slfront.blogspot.com/

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Digitally representing you