Hungarian Theatre Museum and Institute

Since its founding in 1952 the Hungarian Theatre Museum and Institute (HTMI) has been collecting the most valuable relics and data of the Hungarian theatre, bridging the distant beginnings centuries ago with-last night’s performances. A dozen and a half of separate collections enclose the invaluable traces of the art form most susceptible to evanescence: paintings, photographs, stage and costume designs, posters, props, video recordings and many more.

Based on these resources a comprehensive information database is being built, and a unique specialist library and documentation centre is frequently used by theatre specialists, researchers and the larger public. The special nature of the theatrical medium is illustrated by a puppet collection and dance archive, testifying that borderline events, challenging and unknown phenomena are in the limelight of a contemporary theatre thinking.

HTMI publishes the yearbook of Hungarian theatre (a comprehensive data resource), studies in theatre sociology, international and Hungarian drama collections in English, scholarly works, studies on the newest Hungarian theatre tendencies and theatre history in English and French – reaching over forty volumes. HTMI also organises conferences, seminars and numerous roundtables in the most current issues related to theatre production, historiography, museology, theatre documentation often in collaboration with our numerous international partner institutions.