The Austrian Theatre Museum owns a large number of objects, mostly in mixed lots, from the period in question whose origins are uncertain or unknown. They include photographs, prints, hand drawings and, to a lesser extent, possibly also oil paintings and objects from estates and collections of scripts and newspaper articles from the library’s holdings.
A large number of the questionable objects are in collections of photographs and prints; they include mixed lots of portraits of actors, frequently from the 19th century, and programmes and theatre flyers.
The mixed lots “acquired” between 1938 and 1945 were distributed among the relevant collections of the then Theatre Collection of the Austrian National Library. This means that the reconstitution of the original lots, which is an essential component of the provenance research, will in most of the cases involve the investigation of several collections.
The relevant holdings in the Austrian Theatre Museum are being studied intensively for this purpose.
translated by Nick Somers, edited by National Fund
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