It was a great sadness to all at Mary Evans to learn of the death of Grenville Collins on March 18th, a long-time contributor and friend to the library. Our Head of Content, Tom Gillmor, who worked with Grenville for over 16 years, looks back at a very unique collection and the generous character of the man behind it all.

As is quite often the case with new contributors 'finding a home' with Mary Evans, Grenville received a recommendation (from a mutual contact in the image world) to contact us. This led to a very enjoyable initial visit to Pimlico in September 2008 to dive straight into his postcard collection, meticulously ordered and stored thematically and topographically. I was immediately stuck by the quality of the collection which (at this stage) had a very tight focus on late-Ottoman era cards produced by the very best publishers in Turkey, including those published by Max Fruchtermann, the most prominent early publisher in this field. I was not only delighted by the unique and exquisitely-presented nature of the collection but also by Grenville himself, who was engaging, entertaining and immediately took great interest in Mary Evans Picture Library and the picture business. I knew straightaway that the 'task' of transferring this sizeable collection into a useable resource for image buyers was a challenge, but one I was determined to conquer. Thankfully, Grenville shared my energy and enthusiasm and we quickly launched into regular cataloguing sessions.

Our weekly meetings would involve Grenville pre-selecting a decent stack of 150-200 postcards from his collection, which I would then caption and keyword. We researched the details as we proceeded, always determined to seek out that extra nugget of information, precise date or location, or perfect keyword. From the outset we were trying to create a collection which would sit as a gold standard in regards to data and image quality. Very quickly we fell into a harmonious working relationship, fuelled by superb Jamaican coffee, French biscuits, regular laughter and constant excitement when a discovery was made or a gap in the collection was filled. For Grenville, quality of image, perfection of composition, style and rarity were all equally vital.

Having started with the Turkish collection, we moved geographically through the regions of the former Ottoman Empire, cataloguing many hundreds of cards from Northern Africa, up through Greece into the Baltic States, before working through Grenville's extensive collection of cards from Eastern Europe. The content of the cards, whilst primarily topographical, began to broaden too, encompassing social scenes, street trades, regional traditions and religious themes - providing a rich flavour of every territory covered. Possibly to counter the intensity of the workload we often spoke of one day launching out on an actual 'World Tour' to visit all of the favourite places our captioning quest was taking us. A well-travelled man himself, Grenville would interject regularly with stories from his own time spent with his wife, Sue, in Turkey and the Caribbean.

Grenville only started collecting postcards in 2002, the end culmination of a lifetime passion for collecting which started as child, when he amassed Dinky Toys. Following a childhood in North-west England, Grenville worked as a stockbroker in the City before taking a spectacular career turn by co-managing The Kinks from the start of their career through to the early 1970s. The passion for collecting fed into Grenville's subsequent work as an art dealer, before a move back to London necessitated the shift to smaller items, hence the immediate appeal of postcards. The huge collection was gathered through early morning visits to postcard fairs, advertisements placed in magazines, trawling through boxes in antique markets and non-stop surveillance of online auction websites. Away from cards, Grenville was also a founder of the Muhyiddin Ibn 'Arabi Society, with the aim to promote a greater understanding of the work of Ibn Arabi and his followers. He served as its active Chairman for 45 years until 2022, subsequently becoming a Life President of the Society, a great honour of which he was immensely proud.

Grenville took great delight in 'surprising' me with cards he had recently acquired, either on a topic he knew would interest me, something completely off-the-wall or (on occasion) quite outrageous. Very quickly he established an astute and clear impression of what we both deemed the perfect 'Mary Evans' image and his collecting shifted accordingly, broadened and diversified. No longer were there any limits on what was sought out; the 'image' was now the key. Illustrators such as Lance Thackeray, Percy Bradshaw, Tom Browne, Phil May and Manuel Wielandt were great favourites, many of these casting a humorous eye on affairs close to home. Large-letter cards, the silhouette dusk scenes by Stewart & Woolf, exaggeration cards, souvenir packs and sets, hold-to-light cards and collections covering rare and distant places were prioritised. Some of the most well-known and highly regarded real photographic postcards (RPPC) publishers were also often featured in our cataloguing quest, including cards by Rotary, Beagles', Valentines, W. H. Smith (Kingsway Series) and Davidson Bros. Constant amongst all of this variety was our admiration for the cards published by Raphael Tuck & Sons, which can be found throughout the collection.

Working with historical imagery, it's tricky to predict what a client will want and what will be used, the skill is in the choice of what to collect, caption and scan, what to prioritise and a clear belief in the value of quality, consistency, research and intelligent captioning and keywording. In a short space of time the images from Grenville's collection at Mary Evans were being regularly found and used by clients. In the current picture library world, the approach cannot be further removed from the mass-production of content, automation of data-generation and the current fascination with generative AI.

I feel a great sadness that there will be no further opportunities to grow the collection alongside my great friend, but also an immeasurable gladness the fates conspired for us to meet and work together. I am determined to keep the process going as best I can in Grenville's memory - to date we have created a collection of over 36,000 images - I would love to reach 50,000 one day to truly complete the task we set out to achieve.

Hopefully, through the images Grenville collected, those we selected and the captions we wrote, something of the fun, joy and excitement we experienced can spread, as more people discover the collection and dive into Grenville's unique and magical postcard world.

Here is a link to view a small snapshot selection of delights to be found within the collection.

As the Muhyiddin Ibn 'Arabi Society so perfectly described, Grenville was 'a dear friend to many and cultivated a generous fineness of spirit throughout his long life.' He will be greatly missed.