Art Collection: Works

The History of the Goodman Collection

During the 1980's, the Canadian Studies program at Trent University offered a reading course on Canadian Biographies dating from 1860 to 1950. The course was taught by Professor Wadland and offered students a chance to explore an area in which they were interested in. Elizabeth Wilton was a student who was interested in art history and decided to research the English-Canadian painter Marmaduke Matthews.

In the process of her research, the name of a Toronto area dermatologist and important art collector, Dr. Jack Goodman, came up quite often. She decided to contact him and after a few initial conversations with Dr.Goodman, both Ms. Wilton and Professor Wadland were invited to visit the Doctor's private art collection. He had quite a substantial collection of Canadian art from the mid-nineteenth to mid-twentieth century that included many works by Marmaduke Matthews.