| Description | Holdings for the Historical Records of Dartington College of Arts largely consist of promotional materials, student work and records relating to the merger between Dartington College of Arts and University College Falmouth. The bulk of the records in this Collection date from after 1991 when Dartington College of Arts became independent of the Trust. It is this indpendent body which went on to merge with University College Falmouth in 2010.
Particular highlights include:
- Promotional material, including: leaflets and cards advertising DCA c2000s, graduation and award ceremony programmes 2004-8, prospectuses 1997 - 2009, promotional CDs and DVDs
- Promotional photogrpahs taken by Kate Mount including: performances, staff, graduations 1990s - 2000s (See DCA/KM)
- A large series of mini DV tapes, largely of recorded performance pieces for assessment including choreography, performance, theatre, Dartington campus festival, contemporary theatre practice, 1999 - 2010
- Sony PDP-125 digital audio tapes of third year music recitals, 1995 - 2003
- Mini disks of student performances, 2003 - 2006
- DVDs of Dartington campus festival
- CDs, DVDs, mini disks, and mini DV tapes for assessed student work
- CDs, DVDs, mini disks, and mini DV tapes for non-assessed student work
- CDs, DVDs, mini disks, and mini DV tapes for student MA work
- CDs, DVDs, mini disks, and mini DV tapes for visiting artists and lecturers
- Series of posters for events, campus festival, exhibitions and student performance shows
- Ex-student details 1977 - 1989
- Postgraduate dissertations, 2006 - 2007
- Course information booklets, including Visual and Performance Art, Music, Performance and Cultural Location in Contemporary Europe, Contemporary Arts Practice and Dissemination, Choreography, Theatre
- Student handbooks 1997 - 2010
- Press cuttings relating to DCA 1993 - 2005
- Documents relating to the merger with University College Falmouth, including: brochures, sustainability report, Dartington Hall Trust newsletters 1997 - 2007, annual review 2005-6, newspaper cuttings, merger plan, strategic plan
- DCA Limited report and Accounts, 1997 - 2005
- Research papers. 2005 - 2008
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| Admin History | Dartington College of Arts was founded in 1961, having evolved as part of the original Dartington Hall experiment in rural regeneration. It was based at Dartington Hall, near Totnes in Devon, which dates back to the late 14th Century, and is surrounded by a 1,200 acre estate. The Hall was bought by millionaire philanthropists Leonard and Dorothy Elmhirst in 1925, who saw the arts as central to their Dartington enterprise. The Elmhirsts aimed to revive the country estate by restoring the Hall, and modernising the estate's farms, woodlands and horticulture. Dartington was to be an experiment in rural reconstruction. Education and arts activities were also provided to enrich the lives of the community. Leonard and Dorothy Elmhirst believed the arts made an essential contribution to the development and spiritual well-being of the individual and the community. The arts at Dartington therefore grew out of this wider experimental venture, which initially aimed to bring about economic and social change.
Prior to the foundation of the College of Arts, the Dartington enterprise did meet with some local hostility and misunderstanding as it had suddenly introduced a group of outsiders with new, and seeminlgy rather strange, ideas. During the War and the 1950s, rumours of nudity, black magic and other unconventional activities proliferated. Although the Elmhirsts had intended to involve the community in their grand experiment, this only really began with the development of the College in the 1960s. Several local authorities objected to awarding grants to students attending an art centre. This led to the decision to rename Dartington Hall Arts Centre as Dartington College of Arts. It was agreed that the College should retain the function of being an arts centre for the locality as well as being a training institution. From then on, an impressive list of locally-based arts initiatives ensued, emanating from the College, the community, or both. As such the Arts Centre became Dartington College of Arts in 1961, and it became a focal point for the staging, presenting, and teaching of arts, as well as serving the local community.
Dartington rapidly became a magnet for artists, writers, philosophers and musicians from around the world. Notable people involved in the Dartington experiment included Rabindranath Tagore, Jacqueline du Pré, Daniel Barenboim, Arthur Rubinstein, Igor Stravinsky, Imogen Holst, Michael Chekhov, Benjamin Britten, Peter Maxwell Davies, Ravi Shankar, T E Lawrence, Bernard Leach, Paul Robeson, William Lescaze, Walter Gropius, Moholy Nagy, George Bernard Shaw, Bertrand Russell, HG Wells, Yehudi Menuhin, Simon Rattle, Ben Nicholson, Aldous Huxley, James Lovelock, Rupert Sheldrake, Hazel Henderson, Amory Lovins, Jonathan Porritt, Helena Norberg-Hodge, Paul Hawken and Vandana Shiva.
By 1966 the College was encouraged by the Ministry of Education, The University of Exeter Institute and the Local Education Authority to form a course for specialist Art teachers. The new course in partnership with Rolle College, Exmouth, was launched in September 1967.
The principles on which the College's work were to develop in the 70s and early 80s were written into the syllabus of the music degree which began in 1974. It included in the first year an introductory study of World Music and in the second and third years a choice of two of four options: Composition; Performance; Music in Society and Classical Music of North India. Written into all these options was a new practical element. In Performance a recital was to be given to an audience, not just played to an examiner in a studio. In Composition students were to write a piece for a specific purpose and to supervise its performance to a given audience. Music in Society included producing a work in collaboration with a particular group of people either locally or in Bristol where the Music department was sending students to gain practical community experience. The Classical Music of North India included performance vocally or on an Indian instrument, again to an audience. The whole concept of validating work within the actual context for which it had been created was very much in the Dartington tradition. The inclusion of the Classical Indian Music option had its roots in Dartington's history, with Leonard Elmhirst's association with Rabindranath Tagore and the Arts centre's engagement of Indian musicians and dancers in the late 50s and early 60s.
By the 1980s the College's fortunes were suffering. This was due to a number of factors. Changes to the political and economic landscape and the impact of the 1988 Baker Education reform act saw the College facing financial hardships due to a marketization of education. A need to recruit more students, reduce cost and streamline staffing provision, combined with the fact that the College was a tenant of a private trust (meaning the college had no assets to bargain with, borrow against or sell off) placed it in a very precarious financial position. A rapid turnover of principals after the retirement of Peter Cox in 1983 (46 years), unflattering reports from the Council for National Academic Awards (CNAA) and tensions in the relationship between the College and the Dartington Hall Trust all added to a feeling of instability. Facing possible bankruptcy by 1990 it looked as though the College would close. An 11th hour injection of funds from an anonymous donor and Dartington Hall Trust coming to its rescue halted the College's demise at this time. Moving into the 1990s the College gained some stability from an official relationship with Polytechnic South West (later University of Plymouth) who validated academic degrees, and also through diversifying by offering more interdisciplinary subjects and approaches to study.
Dartington specialised in post-dramatic theatre, music, choreography, performance writing, and visual performance and the College held an international reputation for excellence. By 2006 the College provided degrees in Arts and Cultural Management, Choreography, Fine Art, Art and performance, Music, Theatre and Writing. On March 2nd 2007 Dartington College Board of Governors met and agreed that Dartington College of Arts would relocate to University College Falmouth. In 2008 The College officially merged with University College Falmouth adding a range of performance courses to its portfolio. The College relocated to Cornwall in 2010. The decision was controversial and sparked much local protest, as well as protest from the students and staff, including marches and a petition. At the time of the merger Dartington College of Arts had 680 students and University college Falmouth had 2200 students based at Woodlane Campus in Falmouth and Tremough Campus, Penryn. The merger with University College Falmouth was seen as bringing increased resources, support and opportunity for arts students and greater opportunities for vocational study and postgraduate support.
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