Ely

Decorative & Fine Arts Society

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OUR 25 YEAR HISTORY

01/09/2011

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THE ORIGINAL DOCUMENT PLUS ADDITIONAL PHOTOS CAN BE FOUND IN THE 'ABOUT US/DOCUMENTS' WEB PAGE

EDFAS Committee felt that our Silver (25th ) Anniversary celebrations should pay tribute to the people who are responsible for establishing our Society and ensuring its continued success over a quarter of a century.

Jane Ainsworth interviewed Mrs Sylvia Horwood-Smart, President of EDFAS, to find out about our history and we thought that other members, especially those who haven't been involved since the beginning, would also find this interesting.

We must congratulate Mrs Horwood–Smart for her commitment to EDFAS – and to the National Association (NADFAS) and other DFAS - over the last 25 years. She was our first Chairman (1985 – 1988), Vice President (1988 – 1999) then President from 1999. Not only has she devoted many hours to EDFAS on a voluntary basis to ensure its success but she actually set it up.

In1985, the then Headmaster of the King's School suggested to Mrs Horwood-Smart at a dinner party that she set up a Decorative and Fine Arts Society in Ely. He encouraged his senior students to attend but, eventually, they stopped coming to lectures because of their increasing amount of homework. (Our President had already set up three Societies and would go on to set up five in total. The first was West Suffolk DFAS in 1973, after being approached by the Curator of Ickworth House, who felt that it would be good to have one in a National Trust property. He made the library available for meetings until they needed a larger venue. The second was Newmarket DFAS in 1976; one of their first lectures was by Sir Oliver Millar, Keeper of the Queen's Paintings. She initiated Saffron Walden DFAS in 1984, Ely DFAS in 1985 and then, as founder President, Bury St Edmunds DFAS in 1993). Mrs Horwood-Smart relished the challenge of proving wrong those who were sceptical about whether a DFAS would work in Ely - 25 years on her confidence has certainly been vindicated. We remain grateful to the King's School for their support and for allowing us to continue to use their premises for meetings.

Mrs Horwood-Smart is fortunate in having some influential and supportive friends, many of whom provided invaluable assistance from the beginning.
Mrs Audrey Clayton Smith, our first Secretary, had
her contribution to helping set up EDFAS acknowledged when she was made an Honorary Life Member.
Mrs Sheila Friend-Smith was actively involved in establishing EDFAS; she was Chairman from 1988 to1991 and served on the Committee in different roles. Bishop Peter Walker and his wife, Jean, offered a great deal of support from the start, including entertaining some of the lecturers and organizing parties for new members; Mrs Walker was our first President.
Mrs Susan Freestone, Vice Chairman, has played a key part in the success of EDFAS for many years.

Several of our current Committee Members have devoted a lot of time and effort to their roles over several years, while more recent members have brought new ideas and are making a significant impact on the running of EDFAS.

Phil Parker was presented with an engraved platter by our President in appreciation of his 25 years' service as Treasurer.
Mrs Friend-Smith sent her congratulations to EDFAS on reaching our 25th Anniversary: “Many thanks to all the Chairmen and dedicated Committee Members who have followed the pioneers in enabling Ely and the surrounding area to benefit from the inspirational resources of NADFAS”.

EDFAS has changed and developed over the last 25 years in response to Members' preferences and taking on board new technology. For example, we are trying to provide information in different ways to communicate more effectively with existing Members, to invite you to give us feedback and to make any suggestions. We also want to attract new Members and would be grateful for any assistance you can give us to achieve our aim of exceeding the highest number of Members we have had so far – 215 in 2003. Our website was set up in July 2008 and we are improving its content and layout to encourage more people to use it; in 2009, our first full year, we had 2 222 “hits”, which is an average of 185 a month. We introduced a topical, illustrated newsletter last year to keep you informed of events and we changed the membership card this year to include details of our lectures, which were previously only available on the website. We would like to make greater use of email with those of you who have it because this is an efficient and cost effective tool for maintaining two-way contact.

Mrs Jean Walker, our First President, praised the first year's programme at the First AGM for “enriching our lives and broadening our horizons”. The same can be said for each EDFAS programme over the last 25 years – a total of about 200 lectures plus over 50 Special Interest Days and more than 50 visits. Everyone will have their own favourites; Mrs Horwood-Smart's is the teacher from Glyndbourne, who played a grand piano, while mine is our recent fascinating Special Interest Day on Samuel Pepys, which has inspired me to visit his Library and House.

THE FUTURE OF EDFAS - we need to find a way of attracting young adults as Members so that we can benefit from a wide range of age groups and backgrounds and to nurture their interest in joining our Committee. Their involvement is vital to secure the future of EDFAS and to enable the Society to celebrate its Golden (50th) Anniversary in 2035!