Kira Freije (b.1985) completed a BA in Fine Art at the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art at the University of Oxford in 2011 and received her Postgraduate Diploma from the Royal Academy Schools in 2016. After graduating from Oxford Freije worked with local blacksmiths in Sussex, acquiring the metalwork skills which informed her subsequent work.
Born: 1985 in London
RA Schools student from 2013 to 2016
Gender: Female
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As the Royal Academy Schools Class of 2022 open up their studios for their final show, they reflect on how the building – from its Mayfair location to its crumbling corners – has influenced their practice.
The Starr Fellowship provides a bursary and a studio at the RA Schools for a U.S. artist to develop their practice – we met 2021 Starr Fellow Kevin Gallagher.
From PVC-clad performance art to site-specific sculptural interventions, the work of RA Schools students has thrived despite the pandemic. Charlotte Jansen meets three of the artists as they prepare their long-planned final-year show.
19th-century women faced an uphill struggle to get equal access to training at the Royal Academy Schools. Here, we delve into the RA Archive to learn more about women’s fight for equality.
Ahead of their mid-course show, ‘Premiums’, the Academy’s second-year post-graduate students reflect on the writing that has informed their practice.
Meet Rebecca Salter PRA – the first female President in the RA’s 251-year history. Speaking in 2017 upon her election as Keeper of our Schools, she talks art and the next generation, trying a new culture and swimming in the winter.
In an historic vote, the leading painter and printmaker, Rebecca Salter, has been elected the RA’s 27th – and first female – President.
The RA Schools has been nurturing, challenging and championing art students for 250 years. Before work begins on a big anniversary renewal, we took a look inside to find out what it’s like studying there in 2019.
Amy Sherlock addresses the slump in art teaching in Britain’s schools, and the effect this has on the art education ecosystem.
Britain’s reputation as a creative country is at risk, as threats mount to the education pathway that leads potential artists from school to university to professional life. Sam Phillips reports on the political challenges facing higher education.
Eliza Bonham Carter, Curator and Head of the RA Schools, and RA Schools student Ewan Macfarlane share their thoughts. Cast your vote below.
For our 250th birthday, we highlighted 250 beautiful, odd and inspiring objects from the RA Collection in 25 themes. With a free display exploring how artists have traditionally learnt to draw, in this edition we head into the Royal Academy’s historic schools…
At the heart of the Royal Academy, you can find Britain’s longest-running art school, which has been training artists since 1769. As soon-to-be graduates present their final year show, Skye Sherwin speaks to students and tutors to find out what’s changed in the last quarter millennia.
With two solo shows this year, her final months as the Keeper of the Royal Academy Schools and the job of coordinating this year’s Summer Exhibition, it’s a busy time for Eileen Cooper. In the latest in our ‘As I see it’ series, the artist talks bad reviews, good dogs, and what she’ll do once all this work is done.
How are the capital’s artists using their working spaces today? In the spirit of this year’s Summer Exhibition, which is encouraging artists who have not shown before at the RA, Skye Sherwin visits first-time exhibitors at work to see what they are bringing to the Academy.
Marking a solo show at White Cube Hong Kong, RA Schools alumnus Eddie Peake spoke to us about football, finding himself and “ferocious attention seeking.”
The stage is set and the pressure is on as third-year students from the RA Schools prepare work for their final show, which opens to the public this summer in the studios of the RA. Jonathan P. Watts goes behind the scenes to meet the artists at this critical point.
How do you illustrate a dream – or harder still, Freud’s interpretation of it? RA Schools student Gabriella Boyd has done just that in a new edition of Interpreting Dreams by the Folio Society.
At the RA Schools, post-graduate students have three years to develop their ideas and work. Here second-year students reveal how the course is changing their art, as they prepare their first group show at the RA, Premiums: Interim Projects.
From losing consciousness to sitting motionless every day for three months, the inimitable artist pushes her body to its limits. Watch her in conversation with Bryan Appleyard.
Ahead of their solo shows this autumn, RA Schools alumni and artistic collaborators Eddie Peake and Prem Sahib describe the thought and themes behind each other’s works.
Six years on from leaving the RA Schools and selling his final year show to the Saatchi Gallery, Tim Ellis has been exhibiting across the world. We head to his Dalston studio.
Have you noticed something different about our banners? Artist Henry Coleman has co-opted them in a sculptural response to the Academy’s forthcoming architectural transformation.
From international photography event Photo London to a Magna Carta tapestry by Cornelia Parker RA, we guide you through the week’s top art events.
The imagined portraits by this RA Schools alumna and Turner Prize nominee are revelations from another world, says Kelly Grovier.
As she launches her new book, Lucy Williams discusses her time at the RA Schools and tells us how her block colour, architectural collages bring a fresh perspective to urban landscapes.
Before she departs for a residency in Connecticut, Mary Ramsden discusses her time at the RA Schools and tells us what she’s been up to since graduating in 2013.
We went behind the scenes in the RA Schools to follow the progress of second-year students putting together their interim exhibition.
As RA Schools students prepare to show their own work midway through their course in ‘Premiums’, some of the students select artists who inspire them.
From her studio in Southwark, the former RA Schools student Grace O’Connor describes how her experience at the Academy formed her future painting practice.
The country has until 28 November to donate, if the Blake Society is to transform his seaside cottage into a permanent home for the artist-poet.
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Today we launched our 2015 exhibition programme. Artistic Director, Tim Marlow, shows us what’s in store for the year ahead.
Vivid colours are coupled with formal simplicity in the recent artworks exhibited by Mathew Tom in the RA Schools studios.
The film ‘Love has no reason’ by RA Schools graduate Julie Born Schwartz has been added to the Royal Academy’s historic Collection.
The artist discusses her exhibition in the RA’s Gallery Café.
The judging panel of this year’s A-level Summer Exhibition Online discusses their selection process.
As students from the RA Schools prepare for their final show, what are their feelings about leaving after three intensive years of study? Some of them discuss the issues they face with Schools tutor Brian Griffiths and Phyllida Barlow RA, who has been involved in art education for 45 years.
For the first time we have joined forces with the British Designers’ Collective to celebrate British talent.
From an ex-RA Schools student to Architect and designer Daniel Weil.
From traditional engravings to cutting edge digital techniques: the RA Schools is a hive of creative approaches to printmaking.
Your chance to own work by an Academician and help us to continue to meet the cost of tuition fees for all students at the RA Schools.
Meet some of the RA Schools students exhibiting in this year’s ‘Premiums: Interim Projects’
There is a fresh spirit of experimentation at this year’s London Original Print Fair, which takes place in the RA’s Main Galleries. Mark Hampson, the RA Schools’ Head of Fine Art Processes, picks the printmakers to watch.
What is in the minds of art students today? We find out what’s feeding the imaginations of RA Schools’ second-year students – and what direction their work is taking – ahead of their group exhibition in the Royal Academy’s galleries.
Artist Vanessa Jackson presents the RA Schools Annual Lecture 2014.
From contemporary maritime art to disemboweled books: everything worth seeing this week.
Culture, history and rejection in the Google era.
This year, 17 students will reach the end of their three-year postgraduate fine art course at the RA.
A one-day symposium concerned with the management of reading, with Lucy Skaer, Angie Keefer, Nina Power, Cally Spooner and Natasha Soobramanien.
Theory, fiction, criticism, confession?
The 2013 ‘Premiums: Interim Projects’ exhibition is an opportunity to see the work of RA Schools students at the midway point of their three-year course.
When should this exhibition be published?