Snow Queen Melts Away

We've been happy to have the Snow Queen costume exhibited in the library during December and January, but this is her final week watching over staff and students at the issue desk.  We've blogged and tweeted about her, in the context of costume design and creation. Click here if you missed the blogpost first time round:- https://whittakerlive.blogspot.com/2018/12/cool-new-library-colleague-meet-our.html
 

We had an Item of the Month displayed from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland Archives, too - the
2016 programme of the production by Stuart Paterson and Dougie Irvine. 

Don't forget, there's a wealth of interesting performance related material in our archives up at Speirs Locks!  It's best to make an appointment with Stuart Harris-Logan, our Archives Officer.   (Ask us, if you need to know how to get there.)

Watch out for our February display theme!!

Costume Design at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland

To be or not to Sewing Bee

You won't be surprised that we teach costume design as part of our production portfolio here at RCS. So it goes without saying that our drama librarians have built up an amazing collection of books to help our wardrobe staff and students. Collection development is a key part of their remit.

We decided it would be a great idea to show you what our drama colleagues have put together over the years, to inspire and inform the people who dress our actors. 

Watch this space! The books are waiting but we haven't got hold of a dummy yet.  Maybe later this week?

We do like our book displays!  Empty, now, and waiting for the new one ....

Storify is Great for Collating Stories, such as our new Whittaker Library Exhibition

Have you come across Storify?  If you have a lot of weblinks and social media clips that you want to collate and share, then this simple application can do the job for you with minimal effort on your part!

We have just curated an exhibition of Scottish music and works authored by RCS staff.  To ensure that we don't lose all the buzz when the exhibition is pulled down, we've kept some of the tweets and photos to share later.

The Storify collated story has been added to the side-bar of this blog, so you can either read it there, or click on this Storify link to visit it on a full Storify page.

Christopher Gough composition for The Unreality of Durham Exhibition

Christopher Gough of the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland has composed the music to accompany an exhibition currently running at Durham World Heritage Site Visitor Centre.  The exhibition lasts the whole of December 2013.

From the University of Durham Alumni Newsletter:-

The Unreality of Durham exhibition
Durham graduate James Croshill-Mills (Zoology, Van Mildert, 2013) will hold an exhibition of a series of illustrations titled 'The Unreality of Durham' in the World Heritage Site Centre on Palace Green. The exhibition will be displayed from the 1st to 31st December. Music composed for the exhibition by Christopher Gough from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland will be played.

Details of the exhibition here.

Molière en Couleurs - Fabulous Exhibition at Royal Conservatoire of Scotland

 
Exhibition: Molière en couleurs

Our Drama Librarian, Alan Jones, has arranged a fabulous exhibition of costume design paintings, with the support of Alliance Francaise de Glasgow and Bibliothèque de la Comédie-Française.  Charles Bétout drawings are now collected all over the world, and will be yours to admire in the Cafe/Bar from 31st October to 20th November.

The exhibition was opened by Bailie Liz Cameron, who was introduced by Hugh Hodgart; representatives from the Alliance Francaise de Glasgow also attended.  Our many guests unanimously agreed that the works are exquisitely drawn.

Costume and scenic design are two essential components of performance art. Operas, operettas, stage plays, ballets, and films all rely on design to create worlds that inspire the imagination.

From the library of the Comédie-Française (the oldest western theatre company in the world) to the Cafe/Bar of the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland come the works of Charles Bétout.

Charles Bétout was a costume designer for the opera for various theatres in France, for fashion magazines and movies. He was the main costume designer of the Comédie-Française between 1919 to 1939.

As part of the Molière en couleurs (Molière in colour) exhibition, 22 of Bétout's watercolour costume designs for plays by Molière will be on display at the Conservatoire.

His drawings are particularly valuable for their intricacy and accuracy of the historical details. He has captured the very essence of Molière’s time in his work. 

Scotland at the Cinema (National Library of Scotland)

Going to Edinburgh for the Festival or the Fringe?*

Cinema Exhibition

Daily until 28th October 2012

Leave time to go to see Scotland at the Cinema, at the National Library of Scotland.

"Celebrate Scotland's love affair with the movies in our summer exhibition, open daily from 15 June to 28 October."

• Edinburgh International Festival: http://www.eif.co.uk/ (9 August - 2 September 2012)
• Edinburgh Festival Fringe: http://www.edfringe.com/ (3-27 August 2012)

Jubilee

The day of the Queen's Jubilee

Was wet, to a chilly degree 

But the Monarch just smiled, 

Her subjects went wild,

And we Scots saw it all on TV.

c. KEMcAulay 

3.6.2012

Image from The Telegraph newspaper's blog

We have a small exhibition of Coronation and Jubilee-related material in the Whittaker Library - do come and see.  (If you speak to our Archive Officer, there's more ...!)

And we've compiled some Jubilee-related search-findings from the library catalogue: take a look at this Diigo Jubilee list (social bookmarking) list.

• Video: Diamond Jubilee Pageant's Musical Finale - featuring our opposite numbers down in London -  the very wet Royal College of Music Chamber Choir!  (From BBC website).
• BBC Diamond Jubilee website is http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-17500000