Birthday photography exhibit may turn into memorial event

AN EXHIBITION celebrating the life and times of the Duke of Edinburgh could help boost the finances of the Royal Collection Trust, it is hoped, as plans for a 100th birthday celebration turn to commemoration.

The trust is reported to have been planning a photography exhibition to commemorate the Duke’s centenary later this year, but all activity has now been paused in the wake of his death.

If it were to go ahead with the permission of the Queen – and the support of the trust’s patron the Prince of Wales – it is hoped that a modified exhibition could prove to be a much-needed “blockbuster” for the charity, which has already suffered a drastic loss of income because of coronavirus. Its shops, in London, Windsor, Edinburgh and online, have now closed during the mourning period following the Duke’s death, and planned tours of the Buckingham Palace garden have been postponed.

All royal residences and galleries are shut, with the trust’s website displaying a simple tribute to the Duke in line with the Queen’s wishes for mourning.

A spokesman for the trust did not comment on whether the exhibition could go ahead when appropriate, noting that plans for the 100th birthday – though reported last year – have never been confirmed.

Admirers of the Duke will hope to have a chance to see images from his long life, and an insight into the changing world through his decades in the public eye.

In December, The Daily Telegraph reported that the Palace were considering how to mark what would have been the Duke’s 100th birthday on June 10, despite his constant desire to cause “no fuss”.

The trust has already suffered serious disruption and financial losses during the pandemic, as galleries and palaces were closed in line with government guidelines.

The recent annual finance report from Buckingham Palace, released in September, recorded a £5million loss in income from the trust in the first months of the pandemic, with further damage caused by later lockdowns.

The trust last year borrowed £22million from Coutts, and is expected to lose more than £60million in 2020-21 after palaces closed last year.

The charity is dependent on tourists for 80 per cent of its income, with twothirds of visitors coming from overseas.

The Duke has left a personal collection of 11,000 books in his personal library at Buckingham Palace, as well as his own paintings, letters and papers for the archives.

Andrew Morton, the royal biographer, this week wrote: “In his final few weeks the Duke, who had a horror of throwing anything away that might be of historical importance, was ensuring that his affairs were as shipshape and Bristol fashion as this former Navy captain could make them.”