Meet the Staff - Jessie Hopper

1. Who are you and what is your position?

My name is Jessie Hopper, and I am a Graduate Assistant at the Ballets Russes Archive.

2. Please give us a little bit of background about you.


This is my second go-round at the University of Oklahoma (OU).  I have a BA in History from OU, and a MA in History with an emphasis on Museum Studies from the University of Central Oklahoma (UCO).  I am currently in my final semester of my MLIS program at OU, with a specialization in archives. 

3. When did you come to the Ballets Russes Archive?


I came to the Archive in August 2012 and will stay on until my graduation in May.

4. Why did you become a part of the Ballets Russes Archive?


Dr. Cecelia Brown, director of the School of Library and Information Studies (SLIS), mentioned the Archive during my in-person visit to SLIS, and she thought it might be a good fit for me due to my interest in archives and my background in museum studies.  I applied in the Spring of 2012 and got the job.

5. What aspects of the Ballets Russes Archive have you worked on? 


I have done nearly everything in the Archive thus far.  I have processed, arranged, and catalogued collections, worked with different groups on campus and in the School of Dance to develop an exhibition, created policies and procedures, collaborated with the other GA’s on workflows, and wrote many, many finding aids in EAD. 

6. What are the biggest challenges you faced in working with the Archive?

I have had a few challenges.  The first was that I had never worked in an archive when I first started here.  Luckily, I had worked in collections at museums, and I had a very patient Tara Davis here to help me out when I had questions.

My next challenge came with learning EAD.  Both Tara and Jeri went to EAD workshops before I started, so they had an idea of what to do and why we were doing it.  Tara taught me how to get going; yet after I began the process, she graduated, leaving me fumbling around for answers on the Internet.  I had to figure a lot of things out on my own, which resulted in a good-sized collection of EAD finding aids for the Archive.  However, when I did get to go to EAD training, we discovered that we had been arranging things incorrectly and would have to rewrite them all, in addition to a new format for EAD. 

Finally, what I’ve learned is that working within a University system can be challenging.  Trying to get approval for policies, collaborating with other agencies, and making major changes have to go through multiple levels of approval and supervisors.  Just give yourself lots of time to get things done, or you might be upset with the hurry up and wait.

7. What are the biggest successes you have achieved with the Archive?

The biggest single success that I have had is getting the material we selected to an exhibition in Russia.  We spent a lot of time working with people from different departments to make sure that our material was properly documented, digitized and available to be sent digitally to the Bakhrushin Museum in Moscow.  It required us to continue processing and databasing the Bechenova collection as we were digitizing materials to be sent.  Nearly every day, Sierra Codalata would be cataloging Bechenova’s photographs and say, “Hey, look at this.  Wouldn’t it be great to send too?”  Many of the pictures that were finally included in the exhibit came from that collection, so the work really paid off.  When our director, Mary Margaret Holt, came back with the pictures, we just looked at them and pointed out the ones from our Archive and grinned.

Another success is really something that has come from a challenge.  I thought I knew how to do EAD finding aids, but a workshop in November of 2013 showed me that not only were the standards and methods changing, but our structure for how we intellectually organized our material was faulty.  By facing up to this challenge, I have been able to create new finding aids that fit with the current standards and should be useful for future researchers.

Finally, I think this blog has been a success.  Social media has changed how we view ourselves and the Archive needed to have a presence on the Web outside of a standard website.  By including posts on the staff, our collections, and news from the Archive, the Ballets Russes Archive has made itself more accessible to researchers, donors and other information professionals.

8. What are your favorite projects you worked on with the Archive? 


I love when researchers come to the Archive or send us questions via email.  It makes me incredibly happy to know that people have seen our website or Facebook page and want to know more about a specific person or event.  We did a request for the granddaughter of one of our donors where we found some of the interesting pieces and digitized them for her to use in a report.  It was really satisfying to see the collections being used by the family and knowing that they were happy we were keeping their family’s memories safe.

I loved working on the Bechenova collection.  It was the first collection I had taken from receiving the shipped boxes to coming up with a processing plan to actually processing and arranging the material.  We haven’t gotten it digitized yet, but 900+ photos will take a while.  Perhaps the most fun I had was working with Michelle Merriman determining where the photos were from.  We had all of these post-its with country names on them to put the piles of photos on as we went.

The Russian exhibit was both the most awesome and most challenging thing I have been a part of here in the Archive.  Communication really is the key when you are doing that kind of project.  I’m glad we accomplished our goals, but I really wanted a nap at the end of it all.

9. What are your favorite items or collections in the Archive? 


The Bechenova collection is my favorite.  It’s partially because it was the first collection that I took from start to finish, and partially because it is so very different from what else we had in the Archive.  It contains nearly a complete set of programs from South and Central America when the Original Ballet Russe was “sojourning” there in the 1940’s.  It gives such a different view on what dancing was like for the company and what the conditions were like for the dancers.

I also love Nina Novak’s unicorn mask.  It was the first piece I really got to work with as I determined the preservation materials for keeping it safe.  What is crazy to me is that someone could dance with that giant mask on their head while wearing pointe shoes. 

10. What are your hopes for the future of the Archive?

I hope that it continues to be a learning center for SLIS students.  I know that I am truly prepared to go out into a position in “the real world” due to my experiences here.  I have gained so much knowledge about how an archive works and the skills and abilities that a good archivist should possess that I would never have gotten in a traditional internship.  I have written policy, developed a blog, created procedures and workflows, and gotten to process collections. 

I also hope that the Archive can expand to include more material from the everyday dancers.  Yes, the stars are interesting, but the core company members were the heart of the Ballet Russe.  Their materials tell what it was like for everyone else while dancing and travelling.  These are the dancers that opened schools or started companies that have trained the dancers we see today.  How lucky are we to get to preserve their memories for the future. 

To Russia With Love

Last summer, the Ballets Russes Archive was a part of our first international exhibition, with materials from the Archive sent off for inclusion in a unique exhibit of costumes, photos, and programs relating to the life of Colonel Wasily de Basil, who was the founder of what would come to be known as the Original Ballet Russe. The experience of choosing materials for the exhibit was interesting, and the rewards of seeing our items on display was extraordinary.

In March, Director Holt received a request from the A.A. Bakhrushin State Central Theatre Museum, which displays theatre relics from Russia,  to send materials for an exhibit that would be held in August, titled Russian Ballets by Colonel de Basil.   The Archive has two significant collections documenting dancers who spent much of their careers with Original Ballet Russe. 

Nathalie Branitzka-Hower danced in both Diaghilev’s Ballet Russe and Colonel de Basil’s Original Russe. Her collection, the most diverse in the Archive, contains programs and photographs from the early years of the company, including programs from the combined Blum and de Basil’s company and the first Australian tour of the Original Ballet Russe in 1936 and 1937.  

The Tatiana Bechenova collection contains the most complete record of the Original Ballet Russe’s time in Central and South America. Bechenova danced with the company from 1939 to 1947, and the collection contains more than nine hundred photographs and three hundred programs.  When the initial request came in, the Bechenova collection was not fully processed, and the pictures were still mostly uncatalogued.  We had to keep processing quickly to make sure we did not miss something that might be relevant to the exhibition.  Every once in a while, Sierra Codalata, our Dance Fellow, would say look up from her cataloging and say, “Look at this – wouldn’t it be perfect?”  

The Bakhrushin requested we send digital copies to avoid the expense of sending materials overseas. To send the materials, we engaged in collaboration with the OU Libraries. They helped us set up better storage for our digitized materials as well as helping us to transmit the materials to Moscow in a painless and easily accessible way.

Getting the confirmation that our material had indeed made it to Moscow was exhilarating. We were unsure which, if any, of our materials were incorporated into the exhibit. Luckily, Director Holt, with support from the College of Fine Arts, was able to travel to Moscow for the opening. She met with the curator and staff of the museum as well as other members of the Ballet Russe community, and she returned with a number of photographs of the archive’s programs and images displayed in the exhibit.

Several of our pieces were used in large scale displays in the exhibit, such as this from near the entrance.

The majority of our materials were used in this spectacular map piece.  Many of the photos and programs we sent were included, particularly in and around South America, due to the extensive collection of materials we had from the Bechenova collection.

All in all, we were pleased by the way our first international collaboration went, and we look forward to doing it again in the future.  

If you are interested in reading more about our experience from an archival viewpoint, please check the November/December issue of Archival Outlook.