“If ever, now it is still possible to collect material of priceless value for the historically true image of our theatrical past.”
This was the belief of Janko Traven, the Slovenian Theatre Museum’s first managing director. The museum was founded on 29 November 1952, on the 60th anniversary of the Provincial Theatre, the earliest form of the Slovenian National Theatre (SNT) in Ljubljana. The museum was a part of the SNT and its domain were the SNT premises at Cankarjeva cesta 11. Traven took over the massive task of collecting the vast quantity of materials that were previously owned by different archives of Slovenian theatres or by theatre workers themselves, without a mutual system. His definition was clear: “The primary task of the museum would foremostly be to collect, preserve, process, identify and exhibit historically important materials of Slovenian theatres.”
At the 70th anniversary of the museum’s foundation, we remember Traven and his fellows, as well as their successors, who processed the urge for the museum’s transformation to an institute. Since 2014, SLOGI is the legal successor of the Slovenian Theatre Museum.
From our Collections – November 2022 Poster:
