The Frontyard Library

Frontyard library is an extensive arts collection, founded on the decommissioned Australia Council for the Arts Research Library, and a growing collection of works relating to and generated by people who've spent time at Frontyard.

The Australia Council’s library was decommissioned in November 2014 due to very low usage levels over a sustained period. While the collection was small, the Council endeavoured to have key materials remain publicly available through donations to other libraries. Items that were unique to the Australia Council collection were offered to the National Library of Australia in Canberra.

See Michelle Kelley's essay, Library in Bloom, produced through a Sydney Review of Books/Frontyard residency in 2018. You can do a residency in the library too!

We would like to thank:

• The Australia Council for the Arts and Rachel Smithies and Amanda Coombes in particular for their generous donation of the collection to Frontyard.
• Marrickville Library for lending us some bookends
• Isabelle Hore-Thorburn, Eddie Hopely, Kailana Mia Sommer and Peter Williamson for helping catalogue this mammoth.
• Benjamin Forster, ex-Frontyard Janitor & Chief Librarian, for salvaging the Australia Council collection and tending it valiantly between 2014 - 2022!

An incomplete list of items at the time of decommissioning is available. Not all the items listed are within the collection.

Library & Publications Working Group

The Library & Publications Working Group tends to the ongoing care and exploration of the library, as well as our common publishing imprint (we have ISBNs!. The Working Group meets regularly, if you'd like to get involved, drop us a message via our #library channel in the Frontyard Slack

Catalogue

View the catalogue spreadsheet.

   BOOKS ARE FOR USE.
   EVERY READER [THEIR] BOOK.
   EVERY BOOK ITS READER.
   SAVE THE TIME OF THE USER.
   THE LIBRARY IS A GROWING ORGANISM.
   (S. R. Ranganathan, 1931)