The Research Centers
The Photo-Archives contains a unique collection of more than 140,000 meticulously documented photographs, slides, architectural drawings, and site plans of South Asian art and architecture. These document a range of visual traditions from the subcontinent including stone, metal and terracotta sculpture, numismatics, manuscripts and miniature paintings, as well as Buddhist, Jain, Hindu and Islamic architecture. About 3000 monuments from 2000 sites and 300 museums have been documented. Photographic documentation is meticulous, proceeding from general views to details for each monument and object. These records have been created by the Center’s skilled documentation teams, consisting of photographers, draftsmen, and researchers, who have carried out an ambitious program of field documentation for over thirty years. Some photographs and negatives also have been added through gifts by individual donors who recognize the Center’s capacity to make them available for future generations of scholars.
Plans of temples, mosques, tombs, and secular buildings, none of them previously drawn, supplement the Center’s outstanding photographic collection. Some 5000 scholars who use the facilities every year depend on the Center for their research. The photographic archive is now being placed on line in a searchable database and the Center has begun serving an even broader audience, including school teachers and others who cannot easily travel to the Center for research. About 50,000 images of a total of 140, 000 are available on – line at http://dsal.uchicago.edu/images/index.html As the copyrights for most of these records is vested with the Center, scholars can avail of copies of these for research and publication purposes. For details contact the CA&A Archivist at caa.archives@aiis.org.in
The Center has been engaged in research projects so large that they can be done only by teams commanding the vast research resources of the Center. Of these projects, the best known is the highly acclaimed, comprehensive Encyclopedia of Indian Temple Architecture. Seven volumes in two binds each of text and plates have so far been published.
CA&A’s Outreach programs. The Center is currently embarking on new projects and outreach programs that reflect the broader awareness of the importance of visual traditions for understanding culture, both that of the past and of the present. As attempts to include Indian art into general studies of world art grow, it seems timely for the Center to embark on efforts to bring detailed scholarship to new audiences. This effort is directed at considering the needs of various audiences beyond traditional art historical ones.
Workshops and Training Programs
The Archives and Research Center for Ethnomusicology houses extensive
collections of recorded Indian music, all meticulously documented, as well as a
superb library that includes pertinent theses on Indian music. For both
recording and playback, the best available equipment is used, and documentation
for all recordings is maintained in a computerized database that may be used by
any interested scholar. .A major
project of the Archive and Research Center for Ethnomusicology has been
the collection of all recordings of Indian music located abroad; included
is extensive video coverage of Indian performance. This repatriates recordings
available nowhere else in India and makes them centrally available for scholars
everywhere. Recordings as old as the 1930s are now maintained by the Center,
where they are preserved under optimal archival conditions. So outstanding are the facilities that they have served as the model for comparable
ones elsewhere in Asia.
Today ARCE has 128 collections of field recordings in its archival collections.
The day to day activities of ARCE consist of following an active program of
acquisition, cataloguing, preservation and dissemination. The vault at ARCE is
strictly climate controlled for temperature , humidity and is dust protected.
There is an audio visual laboratory which is equipped for making preservation
copies of incoming material as well as for the making of working copies and
research copies for users. There is a listening room dedicated for the use of
scholars, equipped with high quality audio and video equipment for listening and
viewing of archival material.
In addition to the archives of field recordings, ARCE has extensive collections
of published recordings ranging from classical music to folk and popular genres
from all over India - from 78 rpm discs to CDs. There is a small but growing
collection of published world music as well. The ARCE library has approximately
10,000 books, apart from journals, and collections of offprints and newspaper
cuttings. The focus of the library is on the field of ethnomusicology and
related disciplines, with a regional emphasis on India.
ARCE also holds special programs such as the well-received "Remembered Rhythms" festival on the Diaspora and the Music of India, supported by a generous grant from the Ford Foundation. This program was held in a number of venues throughout India during the month of February 2005.
Addresses:
Archive and Research Center for Ethnomusicology
22, Institutional Area
Sector 32
Gurgaon, Haryana
Telephone: 91-124-2381424
e-mail: shubhac@yahoo.com
Main Contact: Dr. Shubha Chaudhury
Center for Art and Archeology
22, Institutional Area
Sector 32
Gurgaon, Haryana
Telephone: 91-124-2381424
e-mail: caa.archives@aiis.org.in
Main Contact: Dr. U. Moorti
Note: Transportation can be arranged from Delhi to the Centers. Please contact Dr. Chaudhury or Dr. Moorti to make arrangements to use the Centers' facilities.