The story of The Arts Society Nottingham

The beginning

Back in the early 1970's lecturers and students attending an Art Course at the Adult Education Centre of The University of Nottingham in Shakespeare Street became interested in the  National Association of Decorative and Fine Arts Societies (NADFAS) and a number of them got together to form a branch.

Founder members included the late Ruby Crammond and Karin Duckworth who is still a member today.

The Founder of NADFAS

In 1965 Patrica Fay with 5 friends set up the Chiltern Antiques Group giving members the opportunity to study decorative and fine arts.

In 1968 the group was renamed Chilterns Decorative and Fine Arts Society and along with ten other societies formed The National Association of Decorative and Fine Arts Societies, NADFAS The group became a registered charity and local societies began to pop up all over the country.

Inaugural Meeting

Meeting in each other’s homes, the group formed a commttee to plan a lecture programme. Ruby Crammond agreed to be Chairman and contacted The National Office to register interest in forming a Society. The Nottinghamshire Decorative and Fine Arts Society became the 66th society to be launched and affiliated to the National Association of Decorative and Fine Arts.

The Inaugural meeting was held on Wednesday 1st October 1975 at the Victoria Hotel, now the Hilton. The guest speaker was Mr Wellesley Clinton from the Victoria and Albert Museum. His talk was entitled ‘An Introduction to English Furniture’. Mrs Zena Walker of the Executive Council of NADFAS also attended.

The Society became known as Notts DFAS for short. It was not until June 2017, when NADFAS was renamed The Arts Society, that the current name of The Arts Society Nottingham was used.

First Years

In our first year, there were eight monthly lectures with nine in the following year., Some of the first lectures were given by members. Founder member Karin Duckworth teacher and lecturer of art spoke in March 1976 on ‘How to look at Paintings’ and, in January 1977, on ‘Impressionist Painters’ including Monet, Degas, Morisot and Renoir. Other notable lectures in that period included topics on Wedgwood pottery, English Country Houses, Mughal Gardens, Regency furniture and Elizabethan-Victorian Jewellery.

The trend was set with seven external visits to locations such as Royal Brierley Crystal Works, York Minster, Sudbury Hall and Luton Hoo. Three Courses were also arranged covering a more detailed look at Derbyshire Country Houses.

Venues and Social events to 1997

In the early years, as noted above, we initially made use of members houses. Our first formal venue was the Victoria Hotel (now the Hilton) on Milton Street, followed by the YMCA on Shakespeare Street from 1978 – 97,  which had been described as a jewel in Nottingham’s heritage.  It is a grade 2 listed Art Deco building from the 1930s. Our Study days (see below) provided more concentrated lectures in a single day, often with lunch, so needed improved venues for catering such as St Judes Church Hall and The Masonic Lodge on Goldsmith Street. Some Study Days were also combined with visits.

Annual Evening Social Events started in 1977 until 1995. Venues included the Masonic Lodge on Goldsmith Street, Nottingham University Club, St Jude’s Church Hall and several village halls, always with a speaker and supper.

In 1985 the 10th anniversary was celebrated with a supper evening in the White Lady Restaurant at Newstead Abbey (closed in 2003)

Images of locations we have used up to 1997 are shown below.

Study Days and Visits

In addition to the monthly lectures, visits to places of artistic interest were arranged and Study Days were started.

Study Days, held in a variety of venues, giving members an opportunity to study a topic in more depth, were growing in popularity.

Visits to places of artistic interest included The Ashmolean Oxford, the Wallace Collection in London, Birmingham Art Gallery, the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, Ickworth and as far away as Glasgow (with an overnight stay) plus to places much nearer to Nottingham.

Lecture Subjects in the middle years

With a growing membership monthly meetings continued to be very well supported and included lectures on English Watercolours Ravenna Mosaics, Vesuvius, Chinese Embroidery, Australian Artists, Thomas Gainsborough, the Terracotta Army, English Glass, Beatrice Potter, Edwin Lutyens, Rennie Mackintosh, Canaletto’s Venice, Faberge, Grinling Gibbons, Eric Gill, African Tribal Art, Spode and English Cathedrals, to name but a few in a busy and interesting time for the Society. 

Heritage Volunteers

In the early 90s the Society was considering forming a volunteer’s group in line with other societies and following guidance from NADFAS head office.

Janet Corbett, librarian at Bromley House Library was keen to work with the Society and training was organised with Caroline Bendix in February 1992 for 12 volunteers in book conservation, thus beginning a long association with the library.

Other projects followed and the work was developed in the capable hands of Hilary Olleson, a member of the East Midlands Area committee of The Arts Society. Details of other projects can be seen at

20th Anniversary

In 1995 the 20th anniversary was celebrated on 16th June at Holme Pierrepont Hall with a black-tie supper and concert given by the Ultima Consort. Officers and committee members from the past 20 years were invited as well as current members and it was a successful evening.

Our New Home at Broadway

In 1997 due to renovation work at the YMCA hall, a new venue needed to be found for monthly meetings.

After much hard work by Chairman at the time, Mrs Pippa Jones and other committee members, who visited a number of potential venues, it was decided to move to Broadway Cinema from October 1997. The new venue provided significantly more seating and first class projection facilities. This also allowed space for the society to expand its membership. The first lecture there was given by Myrtle Ellis from the V & A on the Queen’s jewellery.

Lectures, Study Days and Courses from 1997

Since 1997, we have covered a wide range of subjects in our lectures and Study Days. Outstanding lecturers are frequently invited back sometimes to expand on the subject in the form of a Study Day. Some well-known faces from television have also graced our platforms including Leslie Primo, historian, Lars Tharpe from Antiques Road Show (twice), Eric Knowles of Bargain Hunt, Andy McConnell, an expert on glass, and Mark Hill, an expert on antiques and collectibles.

In 2014 a series of courses was introduced, looking at subjects in greater depth over several days, mainly in winter months. Limited to 50 places in the Antenna building, they were well supported by  members, some of whom attended every one. To date eight courses have covered The History of Art, The Silk Road, English Country Houses, Women Artists, Spanish Art, 6 Cities and their Artists, and Patrons and Collectors  -  all delivered by Art Historian Dr Angie Smith.

The link below provides a full list of the Societies events since 1975 and can be downloaded.

40th Anniversary

The 40th birthday of our Society (still under the name NADFAS) was technically in October 2015, but was not formally celebrated until 26th May 2016. The event was held at Nottingham Trent University Conference Centre and began with Mark Hill from BBC Antiques Road show, giving a lecture entitled “Undressing Antiques”. This was followed with a two course lunch.

In attendance were The Deputy Lord Lieutenant of Nottinghamshire, Sue Gorham, the National Chair of NADFAS, June Robinson the East Midlands President of NADFAS, Patsy Bennett and the Mayor of Nottingham, Councillor Mohammed Saghir, together with members past and present. A special cake was cut by the Mayor followed by a celebratory glass of sparkling wine.

Rebranding and new publicity

In 2017, the rather “cumbersome” NADFAS title was changed nationally to The Arts Society. This was to establish a modern and strong brand with a commitment to be coherent and recognisable and to engage across the World with diverse audiences. A series of brand guidelines was published to ensure a consistent identity across all Societies. From the perspective in Nottingham it allowed us to be more outward looking. We prepared a new “pop-up banner” for the foyer in Broadway which subsequently led to a full colour A4 3-fold publicity leaflet distributed in other venues around the City and County. This has been maintained on a constant basis for each season and allows members to pass these onto their friends. In recent years we have also produced a bookmark as a further publicity item.

Broadway update

The seating limit at Broadway (337 seats) had meant the Society having to create a waiting list above 435 members since at least 2016. That list had grown to 60 by 2019. A challenge to the Society came when Broadway announced a major refurbishment in 2019 to improve seating quality and space by reducing the number of seats in Screen 1 to 248. An analysis of previous attendance at lectures indicated that if we were prepared to hold repeated “back-to-back” lectures, then the planned new seating capacity of 248 seats would give the potential to increase our membership above 500 if needed and to scrap our waiting list. Within a few months the society membership had grown to 509. The Broadway re-seating has been a major success and made a more attractive and comfortable venue.

Covid

In March 2020 all activities were abandoned due to the pandemic. Technology came to the rescue and thanks to Zoom, some very knowledgeable committee members, and very patient lecturers, the programme was resumed and proved really successful.

With Covid almost behind us it was decided to restart live lectures in October 2021. In order for members to be socially distanced at Broadway only 121 seats were  made available and masks were worn. That year 446 people renewed their membership and 12 joined.

Technology

With the two-lecture format, Broadway management wanted member sign-in at at screen1. With queues on the stairs, a new login system was introduced in 2022 with bar coded membership cards. This allows members to be scanned in quickly, recording data on spreadsheets for rapid and consistent analysis of attendance. At the same time we introduced Sum-Up card payments for events and membership renewal, followed by website online event booking and membership application forms. In 2025 QR codes replaced barcodes for more efficient scanning.  Technology has reduced admin time and made committee work much easier, with all meetings held on Zoom since covid. Reducing both committee meeting times and cost.

The 50th Anniversary

Our 50th Anniversary sees a very vibrant society with membership steadily growing again since Covid, a lively and interesting programme and thanks to an excellent committee ably led by Ilanah Dance, a very positive future. For our celebrations we have created a celebratory mug with a “50” design consisting of 87 icons representing many of the lectures over our history. The event will be celebrated at our December 2025 Lecture with a cake cutting between lectures and attended by The Lord Lieutenant for Nottinghamshire, Veronica Pickering MBS HAC, tougher with Arts Society representatives form The National and East Midlands area together with past chairs of the Society and current members and guests.