arts and design

V&A and Glastonbury festival to launch new digital archive

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Most festivalgoers’ memories after Glastonbury are a little hazy – or not fit for public consumption – but London’s V&A museum is preparing to publish some of the more tangible and presumably family friendly ones as part of a new online archive project.

The V&A has held archive material from the festival since partnering in 2014, including “posters, stage designs, costumes, interviews, films and other memorabilia”. This initiative will make it available online along with contributions from the public, to mark Glastonbury’s 50th anniversary this year. Following funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council, the aim is for a fully searchable, open source public database to launch in 2021.

Senior curator Kate Bailey said she was “incredibly excited” by the project: “It will allow us to increase public, digital access to the festival’s performance history, and to create research opportunities that trace the extraordinary creativity and impact of the festival’s past, present and future.”

Festival co-organiser Emily Eavis said: “The memories and experiences enjoyed and shared by festivalgoers are what makes Glastonbury so special, and I’m so pleased that such a wealth of fascinating content will now be accessible to everyone.”

The museum made a public call for festival memories in June, and festivalgoers can continue to contribute.

Jean and Michael Eavis cheer from the Pyramid stage, 1992.



Jean and Michael Eavis cheer from the Pyramid stage, 1992. Photograph: Brian Walker/V&A

No new memories were made in the festival’s 50th year, of course – it was cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic, having previously announced a heavyweight headliner lineup of Paul McCartney, Taylor Swift and Kendrick Lamar.

In August, Eavis’s father Michael said they might have to wait until 2022 for the festival to restart. There were also rumours of a September 2021 date. But Emily later stated: “We have no plans to move next year’s Glastonbury to September 2021. We’re still very much aiming for June.”

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