Press Release: Royal Academy of Dance acquires Dancing Times photographic archive

[Jan McNulty]

For immediate release

 

PRESS RELEASE

Date: 27/09/23

 

Royal Academy of Dance acquires Dancing Times photographic archive

 

After Dancing Times ceased publication following 112 years in print, the archive is now housed at the RAD’s headquarters in Wandsworth

 

 

 

Treasures in the archive include the Nicholas Brothers in the 1941 film Sun Valley Serenade

 

• Dancing Times was Britain’s oldest monthly dance magazine purchased in 1910 by Philip Richardson, who founded The Association of Teachers of Operatic Dancing of Great Britain (later the Royal Academy of Dance) in 1920
• Arts industry press and dance journalists lamented Dancing Times’ closure after 112 years in print
• Following generous support from the Trustees of The Linbury Trust, RAD has acquired Dancing Times photographic collection and will catalogue this collection of 20^th century dance, which is one of the largest in the world.

 

Leading dance and teaching organisation Royal Academy of Dance (RAD) has acquired Dancing Times’ photographic archive. The archive comprises approximately 38,000 black and white and colour prints, spanning the period from c1920 to 2000, making it one of the largest collections of 20^th century dance in the world.

 

The RAD acquired the photographic archive after Dancing Times announced it would cease publication in August 2022, with the final print in September 2022. Editor Jonathan Gray stated it was no longer financially viable. The news was met with great sadness from leading dance industry figures, organisations and writers across the UK.

 

Dancing Times and the RAD have a close relationship spanning over 100 years. The magazine’s founding editor Philip Richardson spearheaded the inception of the RAD over 100 years ago when it was founded as The Association of Teachers of Operatic Dancing of Great Britain. As a result of this long history, the RAD will be a natural home for the magazine’s extensive archive.

 

This acquisition has been made possible thanks to generous support from the Linbury Trust who have made a grant towards supporting the acquisition, preservation and cataloguing of the archive, as well as enabling education opportunities for RAD students and the wider dance community.

 

Speaking of the news, Tim Arthur Chief Executive of RAD says: “Not only was the Dancing Times pivotal in the creation of our organisation, it was a much-loved magazine that provided vital discourse around our art form. We are very touched that Dancing Times has entrusted us with its beautiful collection, which we will proudly house in the Wolfson Library and RAD Archive here in Wandsworth, London.”

 

Eleanor Fitzpatrick, Archives and Records Manager says: “We are delighted to receive this incredible resource which both complements and broadens our existing collections. We look forward to preserving the collection as an important historical and valuable research tool for the dance community now and in the future.”   

 

Jonathan Gray, Editor of the Dancing Times from 2008 until its closure says: “I am thrilled that this wonderful collection and resource has been saved for the nation and that it is going to be looked after by an organisation so closely associated with the Dancing Times. Although it’s sad that the magazine no longer exists, I feel sure that my predecessors, Mr Richardson and Mary Clarke, who were so inspirational to so many people in the dance world, would have been delighted by this news.”

 

Stuart Hobley, Director of the Linbury Trust says: “We’re delighted to help secure the future of this extraordinarily rich and diverse collection. From dance legends like Ram Gopal and Fred Astaire, to the passion of local dance competitions; there’s more than 100 years of inspiring stories to discover. And becoming part of the Royal Academy of Dance’s archive is certainly en pointe!”

 

The images in the collection reflect the growth of dance from relatively sparse coverage in the years before 1914, rising in the 1920s and 1930s, growing exponentially in the 1940s and throughout the years of the “ballet boom” in the late 1940s and 1950s, tracing the expansion of contemporary dance in the US and the UK (especially London Contemporary Dance Theatre) during the 1960s and 1970s and the growing popularity of national dance, especially Spanish and Indian. The diversity is one of the collection’s strengths, charting the rise of first the national dance companies, and the rise of contemporary, Black and Asian dance.

 

The collection includes:

 

• Photographs of multiple productions of classics such as Swan Lake, The Sleeping Beauty, Coppélia and The Nutcracker
• Photographs of past and present dance icons such as Fred Astaire, Alvin Ailey, Margot Fonteyn, Carlos Acosta and Darcey Bussell
• Photographs of national and international dance competitions and dance schools
• Complete bound sets of Dancing Times and the Ballroom Dancing Times (later Dance Today).

 

 

Anna Pavlova as The Dragonfly. She inscribed this photo (taken by Mishkin) for Philip Richardson in 1925.

 

The RAD is currently in the process of transferring the collection to the Archive and compiling a subject index of the contents. A full catalogue is expected to take two years to complete and the project is being managed by the Library & Archive team.

 

Containing over 75,000 items spanning 100 years, the RAD Archive is an important record of the evolution of British ballet and dance in the 20th century; from materials relating to the development of dance teaching, a photographic archive capturing the 1940s-1980s British ballet scene, through to special collections of ballet trailblazers.

 

Dancing Times was a monthly magazine that published articles and commissioned photographs on all types of dance. It was first published in 1894 as the house magazine of Cavendish Rooms, London, a ballroom dancing establishment. In 1910 Richardson purchased the magazine, where it soon transformed into one of the most successful, well-respected dance magazines in the world. Previous editors of the magazine include A.H. Franks, Mary Clarke, Jonathan Gray and Nichola Rayner (Dance Today).

 

To learn more about philanthropically supporting Dancing Times photographic archive and work of the RAD, please visit contact the RAD: 

https://www.royalacademyofdance.org/about-us/contact-us/

 

Notes to Editors

 

About the Royal Academy of Dance

 

Royal Academy of Dance (RAD) is one of the most influential dance education and training organisations in the world with a strong global membership in 85 countries. Established in 1920 to improve standards and re-invigorate dance training, the Academy helps and encourages its teachers to perfect their teaching skills and pass on this knowledge to their students. There are currently over 1,000 students in full-time or part-time teacher training programmes with the Academy and each year the examination syllabus is taught to thousands of young people worldwide, with around a quarter of a million pupils per year going on to take RAD exams.

 

 

 

[bridiem]

Excellent news!