From “Sound” to “Sound and Audiovisual” History and Future of IASA

Abstract

IASA emerged in 1969 from IAML, the International Association of Music Libraries, Archives and Documentation Centres. The interests of IAML’s members largely focused on music as manuscript or score, and musical sound recordings were dealt with in the Record Library Committee. IASA was founded to consider additional types of sound recordings, including research and oral history. From the frst years of IASA’s existence, the question of the organisation’s relationship to the moving image arose, represented by the International Federation of Film Archives (FIAF). But as early as 1979, a delegate from the United States also brought video into play. With independence from IAML in the late 1980s, an intensive discussion began about the future of IASA and the expansion of the scope of the association to include audiovisual documents. Finally in 1999, the constitution and the name of the association were adapted. The transformation process triggered by this name change is still underway today. It could prove to be an advantage for IASA because it opens possibilities of adaptation to the rapidly changing world of audiovisual production due to digitisation and online media.