Museum of Performance & Design

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The Museum of Performance & Design is located in San Francisco, California in the historic War Memorial Veterans Building on Van Ness Avenue. The Museum collects and makes accessible, free of charge, materials about the performing arts, with a special emphasis on documenting and preserving the San Francisco Bay Area’s rich and diverse performing arts heritage from the Gold Rush to the present. Its unique collection contains more than three million items, including books, photographs, programs, newspaper clippings, audio and video tapes, original artwork and artifacts. The Museum also houses the archives of many local performing arts organizations, such as the San Francisco Ballet, Opera, and Symphony, as well as the Stern Grove Festival, the Ethnic Dance Festival, Pickle Family Circus, and The Lamplighters.

MISSION The Museum of Performance & Design is dedicated to collecting, preserving, and making available to the public materials documenting the history of the performing arts in the San Francisco Bay Area. The Museum is further committed to providing materials and programs related to national and international performing arts, with special emphasis on dance, musical theater, and theatrical design.

HISTORY More than sixty years ago, Russell Hartley started a private collection in his home with the purpose of collecting and preserving material documenting the history of dance. Mr. Hartley, who was both a dancer and costume designer for the San Francisco Ballet in the 1940s and 1950s, searched second-hand shops, traveled to Europe to purchase dance artifacts, and in 1947, established the San Francisco Dance Archives. As the collection grew, it expanded to include all of the performing arts, and in 1975 moved into a branch of the San Francisco public library system as the Archives for the Performing Arts. In 1983, the growing collection was moved to the Opera House, giving the collection 1,000 square feet for storage. At his passing, Mr. Hartley bequeathed his collection to the Archives. At that time, a board was developed and 2 full-time professional staff laid the groundwork toward the creation of an institution.

In 1989 the collection was moved to a larger facility in the Civic Center area. The facility underwent extensive renovation to accommodate the collection, and at the same time the organization took a new name: the San Francisco Performing Arts Library & Museum. The collection continued to grow and in 1999 the Performing Arts Library moved to its present home in the Veterans Building in the War Memorial Performing Arts Center. This larger space better accommodated the growing collection, expanded staff and ever increasing number of researchers using the resources. It also enabled the Museum to exhibit the collection and to hold lectures, classes and special events.

On the occasion of its 60th anniversary in 2007, the organization changed its name to the Museum of Performance & Design to more accurately reflect the organization’s growing mission. Located in the Veterans Building in San Francisco’s Civic Center, the organization continues to collect, preserve, and make available to the public–free of charge–its collection of 3.5 million items and its programs documenting the diverse cultural legacy of the performing arts in California and beyond. Its exhibitions, educational services, and artistic programs reach more than 200,000 youth and adults every year. The Museum holds the largest collection on the West Coast dedicated to the performing arts, and its resources are used by people from all over the world, on site and via the Internet.

The Museum of Performance & Design is an independent nonprofit organization that relies on a variety of funding sources, including memberships, corporate, foundation and individual gifts. It is also funded in part by the Grants for the Arts program of the San Francisco Hotel Tax Fund, and the National Endowment for the Arts.