{"id":349762,"date":"2026-09-18T00:02:18","date_gmt":"2026-09-18T00:02:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/349762\/"},"modified":"2026-09-18T00:02:18","modified_gmt":"2026-09-18T00:02:18","slug":"the-new-york-public-library-for-the-performing-arts-receives-historic-60-million-gift","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/349762\/","title":{"rendered":"The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts Receives Historic $60 Million Gift"},"content":{"rendered":"

The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center\u00a0has received a $60 million gift that will help digitize its\u00a015 million-item archive. The library houses historic materials in the areas of theatre, dance, and music; it’s also the home of the\u00a0Theatre on Film and Tape Archive, a large collection of filmed Broadway and Off-Broadway shows.<\/p>\n

The anonymous $60 million\u00a0donation, which is the largest in the history of the research library, will make\u00a0a large-scale digitization, preservation, and cataloging project possible,\u00a0enabling its rare documents, films, and manuscripts to be easily accessed online.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe performing arts belong to everyone, and breaking down barriers to accessing these one-of-a-kind materials enriches our entire community,” added Roberta Pereira<\/a>, Barbara G. and Lawrence A. Fleischman Executive Director of the Library for the Performing Arts. “Thanks to this historic gift, we will be able to share our archive with people locally and around the world and on their timeline\u2014thus connecting today\u2019s audiences, tomorrow’s artists, and lifelong learners directly to our extraordinary treasures. We are thrilled to open our doors even wider and invite everyone in.<\/p>\n

Despite the popularity of the\u00a0Theatre on Film and Tape Archive, Pereira told the New York\u00a0Times<\/a> that there are no plans to digitize those videos, citing “very complex rights conversation.”<\/p>\n

In conjunction with expanding the digital archives, a top priority of the donor and NYPL is the preservation of fragile physical collection formats in immediate danger of permanent decay, and to offer the public access to collection items that have remained unseen for decades due to their fragile condition. The initiative will immediately target decaying still photography archives and\u00a0at-risk audio and moving image holdings (including\u00a0fragile lacquer discs and wax cylinders), as well as\u00a0rare manuscripts, prompt books, and set models. Among the fragile items that will be targeted for immediate preservation are\u00a0the\u00a0original set models for Stephen\u00a0Sondheim\u2019s Follies, Into the Woods, and Sunday in the Park with George.<\/p>\n

The gift comes as the Performing Arts Library is celebrating its 60th anniversary. It was also awarded the 2025\u00a0Tony Awards\u00a0Honor for Excellence in Theatre.<\/p>\n

Said the anonymous donor in a statement, \u201cLPA is a place where actors and dancers go to prepare for roles by watching footage of the greats that came before them, where choreographers, directors, composers, and other artists go for inspiration. It\u2019s exciting to recognize what far-reaching impact the digitization project will have, both by preserving these valuable materials for future generations and by making them accessible to anyone anywhere around the world.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center\u00a0has received a $60 million gift that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":349763,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[75,84,83,9,24,63],"class_list":["post-349762","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-manhattan","tag-manhattan","tag-manhattan-headlines","tag-manhattan-news","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349762","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=349762"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349762\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/349763"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=349762"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=349762"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=349762"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}