Arts Council of Great Britain: records, 1928-1997

Series description

Context

The Drama Department was mainly responsible for administering grants to and assessing the work of the Council's revenue and annual drama clients and for administering project grants and awards. It also operated the Council's schemes to encourage new writing for the theatre, which had started in 1952. From Spring 1989 the Drama Department took over responsibility for mime from Dance. In the early days of the department some direct promotion had also taken place, with the department administering its own tours of productions around the country. This practice was inherited from CEMA and was soon abandoned in 1959/60. The 1950s also saw the Drama Department interesting itself in training and this interest was formalised in the early 1970s when a number of advisory working parties and groups were formed. These parties and groups were co-ordinated by a Training Committee which reported to the Drama Panel. In 1974 however, the sphere of operations of this committee was expanded to include other art forms and hence it became directly responsible to the Arts Council itself.

Scope and content

This series contains papers relating to a wide variety of different subjects, including materials relating to the administration and policy of the Drama Department, such as the minutes and papers of the Drama Panel and the Young People's Theatre Panel. Also, it contains files relating to Drama Department dealings with other Arts Council and government departments, accounts, and the papers and reports of various working groups and enquiries. In addition, this series contains papers relating to publications and research, and miscellaneous material such as printed ephemera, which was kept for reference purposes.

Arrangement

The files in this series are organised into six categories (1) Arts Council Panels, Committees, and Working Groups (2) Material from other organisations and the Regional Arts Associations / Boards (3) Finance (4) Research, Development, and Training (5) Mime and Circus (6) Miscellaneous. Files within each category are arranged alphabetically.

Access

General information on access to archives at the V&A is available on the archive pages of the V&A website.

Restrictions on access

Access to some unpublished material may be restricted and requests for access can take up to 20 working days to be processed. When applying for access, it is helpful if you can quote the reference number, title and covering dates of the file(s) in question. For very large requests you are advised to contact us to discuss your requirements. All requests should be sent to archive@vam.ac.uk or Victoria and Albert Museum Archives (ref. ACGB), Blythe House, 23 Blythe Road, London W14 0QX.

Detailed catalogue