The Digital Library of the National Theatre of Northern Greece operates daily at the foyer of the Royal Theatre, a space open to the public, where guests - after making an appointment - can have electronic access to the performances archive of NTNG and its rich electronic collection of documents and artworks.
Access to cultural theatre items is now possible on the computers installed in the venue by use of the Interactive Application of the NTNG Cultural Reserve Demonstration set up for this reason. The Interactive Application can provide findings to any search concerning the history of the National Theatre of Northern Greece. In particular, it allows access to 1.350 productions from 1961 to date and 138.833 relevant electronic data. The items included are given in detail below:
A large part of the aforementioned electronic collections was put together three years ago with the digitalization of the Artistic Archive of the NTNG. With the set up of the Interactive Application these collections have been corrected, enriched and transferred to a new data bank so that they can be displayed today in the Digital Library.
Finally, it should be stressed out that the 134.865 electronic files displayed today through the Interactive Application of the Digital Library are constantly enriched. as the Interactive Application is updated on a daily basis together with the theatre website.
The electronis collections created wholly in this framework originated from the digitalization of the Drama School Library and the Theatre Archive Library.
The Drama School Library has digitized, classified and kept in archive 2.176 books (Theatre plays, Performance programmes, Publications on Theatre, Art and History). These books have been analytically documented so that both the Drama School students as well as the visitors of the Electronic Library can start any kind of bibliographical search tracing easily the books they wish.
After the completion of its digitisation, the Drama School Library has been organised and resumed its operation with electronic means. Two computers with access to the Internet and the Interactive Application have been installed and the students can surf the Net from Moni Lazariston both looking into the books saved there as well as into the entire Performance Archive of the NTNG Digital Library.
The Archive Library consists of 2.636 performance texts with notes from the artists working on them. In each of these books the play text is accompanied by rehearsal photographs, sketches, and directions concerning the movement of actors on stage, speech deliverance, stage set, performance music, lighting etc. With full awareness of the value of such texts we have chosen to photograph every single page of such texts from every theatre production of the NTNG thus exceeding the amount of work initially set by the project in question. Today, the Interactive Application features 12.502 pages of such texts, while 90.000 pages more have been photographed and remain to be processed.
The Archive Library also includes the NTNG publications, i.e. performance programmes which had partly been digitized (cover photo) and have now been photographed from cover to cover (14,870 pages) once again surpassing the initial goals set.
Moreover, the Digital Library features the operation of a wifi hotspot – free access wireless network for theatre audiences. For security reasons and due to its wide range, access to the network will be available with the use of a password provided to those interested at the theatre box offices.