CHARLEVILLE MEZIERES

International Puppet Institute

Open Monday to Friday from 1pm to 5pm.

Documentation centre specialising in the puppetry arts, multimedia and multilingual.

The Documentation Centre of the Institut International de la Marionnette houses the largest specialised collection on puppetry in Europe. There's something for everyone interested in this art form.

- over 12,000 books, including 4,700 specialist titles on puppetry, ranging from repertory (over 1,000 titles) to history (1,670 titles) and construction, in a wide variety of languages - French and English, of course, but also other European languages (Spanish, Polish, Greek, etc.) and Asian languages (Japanese, Chinese, Russian, etc.);

- a collection of over 3,200 videos, including recordings of shows and animated films from all over the world;

- over 8,600 documentary files on companies, festivals and organisations from all over the world;

- a collection of over 1,600 puppets, which can be consulted on request by researchers in residence;

- an iconographic collection of almost 11,000 documents, currently being processed, including a treasure trove of photographs and posters;

- around 300 manuscripts, including a large number of pieces from the Guignol repertoire from the late 19th and early 20th centuries; - a collection of 300 periodicals, some of which specialise in puppetry, from all over the world - Europe, America and Asia - some dating back to the 19th century;

- archives of leading scholars and artists: Claude and Colette Monestier, Alain Recoing, Yves Joly, Brunella Eruli, Jacques Chesnais;

- grey literature, printed documentation, etc.

- The documentation centre has an online catalogue listing most of its resources: https://cataloguedoc.marionnette.com/

It serves students, trainees and researchers, and is open to teachers, artists and the general public.
Further information: https://marionnette.com/collections-documentation-editions/le-centre-de-documentation-et-des-collections

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