The Concept of Work in Theater Performances

The IFLA Library Reference Model (LRM) defines work as an abstract entity that represents “the intellectual or artistic content of a distinct creation.” The work entity enables the grouping of equivalent content in search results and enables connecting and relating resources across databases and documentation practices, independent of media and format. This article explores how the LRM work entity relates to and is understood in the context of theater performance documentation. It presents an analysis of different conceptual models relevant to performance documentation and examines how databases for performing arts refer to or include works. The main part of the article, however, is a user study based on interviews with theater researchers on how they understand the concept of work in relation to theater performances. The main research contribution of this work is the gained insight into how the concept of work is understood in the context of theater performance documentation.