GOODEY’S OLD DERBY
BETWEEN the years 1936 and 1945, the people of Derby were presented with an amazing gift of more than 500 paintings, prints, drawings, and photographs of the town, dating from the late 1600s through to the early 1930s.
The donor was philanthropist and art collector Alfred Edward Goodey and his collection of “Old Derby” pictures would go down in local history as the single largest and most important visual record of the town’s development ever created.
Now an exhibition showcasing the collection has opened at the Museum and Art Gallery. A View of Derby: The Alfred Edward Goodey Collection of “Old Derby” pictures features a selection of paintings, drawings, prints, and objects.
Goodey was a larger-than-life character who was well-known in Derby due to his distinctive appearance and involvement in local amateur dramatics, music and art clubs.
Goodey was born in Derby in 1878, to parents William Henry Goodey and Rhoda (née Strutt). He was given a home education and was also a student at the Whitworth School before going on to study at the Derby School of Art.
In 1901 Goodey was a clerk in his father’s manufacturing business, and presumably took it over when the latter died four years later.
He also served in France and Egypt during the First World War, where he is said to have fallen very ill; a circumstance that may have contributed to a renewed interest in collecting art upon his return to Derby after the end of the war.
On Goodey’s return home, the town of Derby was changing – older buildings and narrow streets made way for modern homes and roads suitable for motor cars.
Goodey wanted to maintain a visual record of buildings and areas that were in danger of being lost and commissioned many of the works in this collection.
Goodey had a range of interests including natural history and walking. He was also an amateur Shakespearean actor and a member of the Derby Shakespeare Company. He even arranged for the group to use “The Loft” for rehearsals near his own house in Ashbourne Road. His final role for the company was as the wealthy father Baptista in the Taming of the Shew in 1939.
He has been described as a man about town in plus fours and a full beard and moustache who would frequent his favourite pub and discuss the issues of the day.
It was his interest in art that led him to the presidency of the Derby Sketching Club and a shrewd eye for a painting that would help to record Derby’s history that ensured his notability. The Loft was almost completely demolished in September 2014.
Goodey had amassed a remarkable record of Derby as it existed in the 19th and early 20th centuries, and in 1936 he gave over 500 paintings to the Derby Museum and Art Gallery.
He also bequeathed to the town fur
ther works of art and £13,000 to be used to build an extension to the museum.
He died in Derby in
1945 and the museum now houses not only Goodey’s collection but the biggest collection of paintings by Joseph Wright of Derby.
Goodey’s collection included paintings by Alfred John Keene, a member of the Keene family of Derby which included his father and photographer Richard Keene – who published the first Derby Telegraph in the 1850s; the Derby Daily Telegraph, published by Eliza Pike, arrived in 1879 – his brother William Caxton Keene, and Ernest Townsend.
Three of the paintings given to the Derby Museum and Art Gallery by Goodey were by artist Ernest Ellis Clark. Another was by CT Moore. Images of his collection in the care of Derby City Council have also been published in collaboration with Breedon Books in the book Goodey’s Derby.
As an artist himself, Goodey was keen to encourage art locally and so appointed fellow artists to make works for his collection, notable artists include Alfred John Keene and Ernest Townsend, who famously painted the roof of Derby’s Rolls-Royce Nightingale Road works to camouflage it against Nazi bombers in the Second World War.
Goodey also bequeathed a sum of money towards the building of a muchneeded extension to the Museum and Art Gallery, which was completed in 1964.
Since that time, Derby Museums has acquired personal objects as well as works that formed part of Goodey’s original collection; identified by the survival of a bespoke printed label that was pasted on to the back of each of his pictures.
The collection now numbers almost 800 objects.
A View of Derby presents a selection of works from this vast collection, as well as other objects that explore the context behind its creation and what the works mean to Derby and its people today.
As part of the exhibition, visitors are encouraged to share their memories and knowledge of the places depicted in the collection in the hope that Derby Museums can build up a fuller picture of individual items and the collection more broadly.
Lucy Bamford, senior curator of art at Derby Museums and cocurator of A View of Derby, said: “We always look forward to sharing works from Goodey’s collection with visitors.
“Its importance to Derby folk, almost 80 years on from Goodey’s last gift of pictures to Derby Museums, remains undiminished and will, no doubt, be a big talking point at a time when Derby is once again going through a period of redevelopment and change.
“We’re really keen to capture a sense of what these pictures and the places they depict mean to people today, as well as personal memories that might help enhance the information we hold about the collection.”
A View of Derby: The Alfred Edward Goodey Collection of ‘Old Derby’ Pictures runs from Saturday 23 March until Sunday 26 May at Derby Museum and Art Gallery. The show is free to enter, donations welcome.
Its importance to Derby folk, almost 80 years on from Goodey’s last gift of pictures to Derby Museums, remains undiminished.
Lucy Bamford