From the time we rejected Banksy to Turner’s “gunshot in the gallery”, the Summer Exhibition has regularly ruffled the feathers of British art in its 254 years. Here are some of our favourite moments!
The colour white can be as challenging for the painter as the blank white sheet of paper is for the writer. Ian McKeever RA reflects on James McNeill Whistler’s ability to create form using one of the most elusive colours.
Far from evoking the past, Jock McFadyen RA’s eerie paintings imagine a dystopian future, writes Matthew Beaumont, as he prepares to meet the artist for his RA show, ‘Tourist without a Guidebook’.
Faced with more than a thousand artworks, how can an art lover make the most of their annual pilgrimage to the Summer Exhibition? Veteran critic Mark Hudson draws from his professional experience to offer 10 useful pointers.
Edith Devaney, curator of our upcoming David Hockney exhibition, explores how the artist harnessed springtime to explore the drama of nature, the process of grief – and the power of hope.
Angelica Kauffman and Mary Moser were the only two female founders of the Royal Academy. Here, we take a closer look at their careers and the challenges they faced within the RA.
100-year-old artist Diana Armfield RA writes about the joy of painting the flowers in her garden.
Covid-19 has pushed arts institutions to their limits. President of the Royal Academy, Rebecca Salter, and our Secretary and Chief Executive, Axel Rüger, reflect on the challenges faced by the RA.
Newly elected Royal Academician, John Akomfrah, has been exploring Black British life since the ‘80s. He tells us about being slammed in the press by Salman Rushdie and his love of Virginia Woolf.
Six tonnes of steel mesh, a gallery flooded with seawater, a body you could walk through and an experience like no other. Relive our 2019 Antony Gormley exhibition with behind-the-scenes videos, inspiration from the man himself and works from the show.
Explore the first ever winter Summer Exhibition like never before and discover a myriad of works by household names and emerging artists inside this virtual tour.
Art historian Patricia Berman traces Edvard Munch’s surprising influence on women artists, from Tracey Emin RA and Marlene Dumas Hon RA, to Louise Bourgeois and Maria Lassnig.
Hughie O’Donoghue RA discusses a new collaborative artwork – produced by Royal Academicians to raise funds for the Academy during this critical time.
There’s no right way to be creative – but leading artists and architects have plenty of tips to get you started. We revisited some of our most popular interviews to share creative wisdom from Antony Gormley, our President Rebecca Salter, Lubaina Himid and many more.
In this video from our ‘Artists in Isolation’ series, John Maine RA talks us through the process of making a huge, stone sculpture for Salisbury town centre – and what happens when lockdown lands in the middle of it.
Artists work in isolation, but they do it under the belief that one day people will experience their work. For Chris Orr, it’s the isolation of everybody else that’s frightening…
As part of our ‘Artists in Isolation’ series, Stephen Farthing RA describes life in locked-down Jordan – how he hopes to finish his next painting before lockdown ends, and how the local call to prayer has been louder since COVID-19.
Enjoy this exclusive digital premiere of the film ‘PHYLLIDA’, a documentary portrait of the artist Phyllida Barlow RA. Released on her birthday, this film celebrates her pioneering contribution to the field of sculpture.
These are difficult times for everyone – but art thrives in a crisis, says Rebecca Salter PRA, as we launch a new series of artists and architects documenting their creativity in isolation.
The Impressionists are renowned for their enduring scenes of people and places, whether energetic seascapes or portraits of young women. Four artists – Hughie O‘Donoghue RA, Maggi Hambling, Ishbel Myerscough and Mali Morris RA – describe works that resonate with them in our upcoming exhibition ‘Gauguin and the Impressionists’.
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.
Take a look inside the 250th Summer Exhibition in this video with coordinator Grayson Perry RA, as he shows us some of his highlights of this year’s show.
As the Royal Academy opens its doors after a major redevelopment to mark our 250th birthday, we caught up with its architect, David Chipperfield RA, to hear about his vision for the new RA.
With news that the Irish artist has been selected to represent her country at the 2019 Venice Biennale, we meet Eva Rothschild in her London studio to talk being a sculptor, parent and feminist.
Hanging from the vast Victorian glass roof of St Pancras International, I Want My Time With You is the latest in the Terrace Wires public art series. In this video, Tracey Emin discusses the origins of the work and why she chose these particular words.
Anne Desmet is the only current Royal Academician elected for her work as an engraver. In this online tour, she unearths treasures from the Collection including works by Dürer, Piranesi and William Blake.
“I’ve set out a little curriculum from which you could teach someone to draw,” says artist and teacher Stephen Farthing, as he gives an audio tour of the online collection.
With a new show at White Cube Bermondsey, the artistic duo tell us eight things about their lives, art, fame, bigots, liberals, Brexit, and their favourite East End Turkish restaurant.
The Falling Titan depicts the doomed attempt of an earthbound giant to reach Olympus and overthrow Zeus by climbing up a pile of great boulders, only to be crushed by those very stones.
In the 1950s when British painter Albert Irvin RA caught a glimpse of the explosive New York Abstract Expressionism scene, he abandoned his still-lifes and began conjuring pure sensation and emotion on his canvases. A new show at Whitford Fine Art looks at these early forays into abstract work.
The international architect talks art collections, local communities and working for the disempowered at his London studio.
Bill Woodrow RA’s Fingerswarm is part of a new display of sculpture curated by Richard Deacon RA. Woodrow held a swarm of bees on his bare hand at a beekeeping course, sparking the idea for this surreal sculpture.
With a solo show at London’s Alan Cristea Gallery this month, the printmaker shares the projects, exhibitions and places currently on her radar.
As Renzo Piano celebrates his 80th birthday, close friend and fellow Academician Richard Rogers looks back at what it was like to work together on one of the 20th century’s most iconic buildings – the Pompidou Centre in Paris.
How much do you know about the illustrators who brought your favourite childhood characters to life?
Turner Prize-winning artist Richard Deacon RA talks obsessive collecting, ambiguous titles and finding the interest in everything.
Currently preparing for her retrospective at Manchester Art Gallery, artist and educator Sonia Boyce is the latest to reflect on art, life and lessons learnt in our ‘As I see it’ series. She talks tuition fees, a love of Liberty and why we should all be prepared to dream of something different…
As part of our season exploring artists’ studios, we asked the artists of the 2017 Summer Exhibition – from Royal Academicians to first-time exhibitors – to give us a peep inside their working space, and to share their secrets for a successful studio practice.
With his new 16-metre installation suspended above commuters at St Pancras International, London-born sculptor Conrad Shawcross talks activism, optical illusions and why he likes a bit of trapeze.
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.
From David Hockney’s portraits in palazzi to Phyllida Barlow’s swollen sculptures in the British Pavilion, here’s the must-see work by Royal Academicians in this year’s biennale.
Phyllida Barlow RA’s bulbous sculptures, Robert Cuoghi’s messiah machines and Damien Hirst’s demons – here are ten highlights of this year’s contemporary art spectacular.
In 2018 we’re unveiling new spaces to display the Royal Academy’s Collection. In this video, we take a look at some of the treasures that will be on show, including the UK’s only sculpture by Michelangelo.
How do you make work indoors that’s destined for a life outdoors? With the opening of his exhibition at Yorkshire Sculpture Park, the artist discusses the realities of making art surrounded by rats, sunshine and Henry Moore.
He shot to fame as a painter, but for the past 20 years Gary Hume RA has also made prints. Amy Macpherson visits him at the RA Schools’ print workshop ahead of his selling show in the Keeper’s House.
In our new series, artists reflect on art, life and lessons learnt. Here, Antony Gormley RA explains how he first found his subject, why the arts are vital in education and why he’s ashamed of Brexit.
Working from her garden studio in Sussex, painter Olwyn Bowey RA has tenaciously pursued her interest in the natural world over many decades, and the results are continuing to bear fruit.
As the Academy stages a show of Peter Cook RA’s drawings to mark his 80th birthday, Kate Goodwin asks the architect about his vision for urban ways of life.
A French-born painter famed for his detailed naval scenes, the artist had an adventurous early life, before returning to England in the 1750s to embark upon a successful artistic career and become a founding member of the Royal Academy in 1768.
David Nash RA announced as winner of the Charles Wollaston award.
The official launch of the Summer Exhibition 2016 welcomed some of London’s most celebrated artists and art lovers to Burlington House.
While the past decade has seen more female artists becoming Academicians, they have been a rare sight for much of the RA’s existence, and were even excluded from Zoffany’s famed painting of the Academy’s founders. Historian Amanda Vickery delves into the archives to discover the pioneering women who wielded the brush.
Richard Davey celebrates the independent spirit that characterises Anthony Whishaw RA’s paintings in this extract from a new monograph.
As we celebrate Leonard Manasseh RA’s 100th birthday, we take a look at the architect’s design for Radipole Lake pumping station.
This month sees the opening of the first retrospective of Bill Jacklin RA’s graphic work, tracing his career from his student days at Walthamstow School of Art in the early 1960s to his latest monotypes, created at the beginning of this year.
No one captures New York quite like Bill Jacklin RA, who moved to the Big Apple in the 1980s and never looked back. Nancy Campbell caught up with him ahead of his show of prints and drawings at the RA.
As Leonard Manasseh becomes our first centenarian Royal Academician, his cousin, the architectural historian Timothy Brittain-Catlin, takes a look at a career of over 80 years.
As Yinka Shonibare RA prepares to wrap the Academy’s Burlington Gardens façade in his bold designs, Fiona Maddocks visits the sculptor at his warehouse studio in east London.
The artist tells us why she is inspired by Arctic explorations and the Scottish coastline in winter light.
Royal Academician Diana Armfield tells us about a creative partnership that has stood the test of time.
Less salon, more living room – that’s the ambience of the new-look Academicians’ Room, where club members can relax along with Royal Academicians.
Fred Cuming RA reflects on his long career as a painter in this short film, shot in and around his East Sussex home.
As Piers Gough RA guides us round his practice in Clerkenwell, he tells us what it was like to work with Paul Smith, and what it really takes to be an architect.
Rose Wylie RA announced as winner of the Charles Wollaston award.
The Summer Exhibition Preview Party is one of the most glamorous events in the London calendar – and a major fundraiser for the RA.
Leading abstract painter Frank Bowling RA welcomes a major show that reassesses Jackson Pollock’s black pourings.
As Michael Craig-Martin RA co-ordinates this year’s Summer Exhibition, the Curator and Head of the RA Schools Eliza Bonham Carter discovers in a new book what makes this leading artist and teacher tick.
Behind redbrick walls in an old Berlin factory Fiona Maddocks finds architect Louisa Hutton RA in a calm and spacious haven.
Eileen Cooper RA’s figures exude a fluid spontaneity. Laura Gascoigne meets the artist, ahead of her show of drawings at the Academy.
From Sarah Lucas’s erotic sculptures at the Venice Biennale to Jeff Koons at Norwich Castle Museum & Art Gallery, we guide you through the week’s top art events.
From Fiona Tan’s representational films to Idris Khan’s abstract paintings and drawings, here are five top shows to see this week.
This week, RA Magazine travels to Oxford to take a look at a cluster of art events opening in the city, from the Ashmolean to the Bodleian Library.
Basil Beattie remembers his friend and fellow Academician, the painter Albert Irvin RA, who has died at the age of 92.
A key figure in a group of sculptors who emerged in the 1950s, we look back on the career of Robert Clatworthy, who has passed away aged 87.
When Tom Phillips RA rented a room in a south London house 50 years ago, little did he know the entire house would become his studio.
Each month, we have a quick chat with one of our Academicians to find out what they’re up to and what the RA means to them.
With an exhibition of paintings by John Singer Sargent at the National Portrait Gallery, we take a look at one of this Royal Academician’s most famous works.
Each month, we have a quick chat with one of our Academicians to find out what they’re up to and what the RA means to them.
Each month, we have a quick chat with one of our Academicians to find out what they’re up to and what the RA means to them.
Here at the RA, we’re keen to make sure you’re getting your recommended annual intake of art. Find out now!
Each month, we have a quick chat with one of our Academicians to find out what they’re up to and what the RA means to them.
This short memoir is taken from painter Tess Jaray RA’s new book, ‘The Blue Cupboard: Inspirations and Recollections’.
Behind garage doors at his Cotswolds home, Mick Rooney RA conjures a magical world on canvas.
Revisit this exploration of the meaning of Jones’s works, ahead of his first major retrospective in Burlington Gardens.
Royal Academician Frank Bowling discusses his working practices, his desire to make “pure painting” and the changing reactions to his work throughout his lifetime.
The Royal Academician shares a chapter from her new memoir.
Shortlisted for a major European art award, the Royal Academician tells us about her recent work on show in The Hague.
Each month, we have a quick chat with one of our Academicians to find out what they’re up to and what the RA means to them.
One of the key moments in modern British art occurred one day in 1965, when Allen Jones RA, then in his late 20s, first stepped inside an American casino. Kelly Grovier spotlights the Pop artist’s first step towards iconic status, as the Academy mounts a major show of his work.
Ahead of an exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum, Fred Cuming RA pays tribute to his work, and his lasting influence.
A remarkable look into how a chance encounter in 1988 liberated the Academician’s painting practice.
As abstract art pioneer Sandra Blow RA is celebrated by two Cornwall shows, Jonathan Grimble and Denny Long from her Estate give us a tour of her atmospheric studio space in St Ives.
We take a look at the latest work from the President of the RA, whose paintings embrace the transcendent powers of abstraction.
The Academician’s art dealer and lifelong friend remembers a life well lived.
A few personal notes on a fellow architect and mentor by Sir Michael Hopkins RA.
The Academician and sculptor finds history repeating itself on reading an illuminating analysis of Britain’s first Afghan war.
In the lead-up to his major RA exhibition this autumn, we take a look inside the artist’s huge “gesamtkunstwerk” in the south of France.
We’ve challenged three guest speakers to choose the five works in this year’s Summer Exhibition that intrigue them the most. Fashion historian and DJ Amber Jane Butchart guides us through her favourite works.
People from around the RA pay tribute to leading architect Sir Richard MacCormac, who has died aged 75 following a long illness.
Each month, we have a quick chat with one of our Academicians to find out what they’re up to and what the RA means to them.
As a major Malevich show goes on view, Zaha Hadid RA reveals how her use of painting and drawing to develop buildings was inspired by the artist.
Painter Mick Rooney RA gives his own inimitable take on David Remfry RA’s witty watercolours, a new installation in the department store’s Diamond Jubilee Tea Salon.
Each month, we have a quick chat with one of our Academicians to find out what they’re up to and what the RA means to them.
Tracey Emin RA’s ‘My Bed’ (1998), one of the seminal works of the Young British Artist generation, goes up for sale at Christie’s on Tuesday 1 July.
Art now is more popular than it ever has been. We are in an era where art is at the centre of a public conversation about who we are, and where we want to go.
Wolfgang Tillmans RA announced as winner of the Charles Wollaston award.
The Summer Exhibition Preview Party is one of the most glamorous events in the London calendar - and a major fundraiser for the RA.
Cornelia Parker RA explains what’s different about this year’s Summer Exhibition and the inspiration behind her ‘Black and White’ themed room.
Each month, we have a quick chat with one of our Academicians to find out what they’re up to and what the RA means to them.
Ken Howard RA’s range of interior paints created specially for the Royal Academy is inspired by his beloved Venice, a city where he has had a studio for the past 10 years.
A new exhibition juxtaposing the works of Henry Moore with those of Antony Gormley RA, Richard Deacon RA and Anish Kapoor RA, among others, shows the enduring influence of one of Britain’s most iconic sculptors.
The artist’s new paint range for the RA draws inspiration from his life and work.
A new artwork by Grayson Perry RA presents a special manifesto for the Royal Academy.
Each month, we have a quick chat with one of our Academicians to find out what they’re up to and what the RA means to them.
As you might have noticed, our website has changed. This is the first stage of ambitious plans to open up the Academy and provide new ways to engage with art and artists.
Each month, we have a quick chat with one of our Academicians to find out what they’re up to and what the RA means to them.
Recent years have seen a host of new innovations here at the RA, but the election process for new Academicians has hardly changed in almost 250 years. Here is how it all works.
As exceptional examples go on display in ‘Renaissance Impressions’, printmaker Anne Desmet RA reveals the story behind this pivotal development and discusses why these rare prints continue to dazzle us today.
We put the question to Jennifer Zielinska, part of the RA’s attRAct programme, and Royal Academician and fine artist Cornelia Parker
A recently discovered drawing turns out to be a design by Richard Norman Shaw RA for the biscuit barrel that he presented to the Academy in 1883.
You need to consent to marketing cookies set by Vimeo to view this content.
Inspired by our ‘Renaissance Impressions’ exhibition, Stephen Chambers RA decided to create his own chiaroscuro woodcut. Here he shares his discoveries and includes his step-by-step guide.
We visit the converted stable where the nonagenarian artist Alan Davie RA creates his jewel-like paintings.
In the first of a new series on artists’ epiphanies, Tess Jaray RA reveals three turning points in her understanding of art.
From found objects to Neo-Gothic interiors: everything worth seeing this week.
From contemporary maritime art to disemboweled books: everything worth seeing this week.
From iconic sunflowers to architectural installations: everything worth seeing this week.
‘Hiker Meat’, Venice in Walthamstow and collage at the Whitechapel: everything worth seeing this week.
From 100 works on paper to Asian art in London: everything worth seeing this week.
From Tate Liverpool’s new Duveen commission to the World Press Photo Exhibition: everything worth seeing this week.
From photographic portraits to artists’ museums: everything worth seeing this week.
London plays host to some giants of the art world over the next year. The Chairman of the RA’s Exhibition Committee, Stephen Farthing RA, picks his top five upcoming shows and celebrates innovations born of great skill and maturity.
Sam Phillips meets Sean Scully RA in his Barcelona studio.
The RA speaks about how his love of large numbers influences his sculptures over a steak at Hawksmoor.
Meet the sculptor who chooses materials for their rawness and authenticity to create her haunting art.
The Academician talks about the mix of violence and poetry in her work, as her often explosive art takes her across the globe.
The architect and Academician talks over lunch about searching for “the beautiful idea” when he designs a building.
Fiona Maddocks meets painter and Academician Joe Tilson at his studio in a workers’ cottage in Chelsea.
Over a sushi lunch, the sculptor and Academician talks about “getting away with” art that challenges our preconceptions of the world around us.
The architect and Academician fills his London studio with a sense of fun, as Fiona Maddocks discovers.
Redefining the best of British cuisine with the Academician, who herself is as a conjuror in the world of colour.
Printmaker and Academician Anne Desmet discusses juggling work and family life in a studio at her east London house.
As artist in residence at Maggie’s Cancer Caring Centre, the Academician is a healing presence.
The Academician talks with us from her current studio in Oxford.
We speak to the painter in her minimalist studio in London’s East End, which is filled with an unexpected riot of colour.
The Academician’s Clerkenwell studio is cool, white and ordered - but in it Hume is a warm, unpretentious presence.
The Academician has built his studio in a converted granary, in the Shropshire landscape made famous by A.E Housman.
Evidence of Albert Irvin’s thirst for adventure on canvas can be seen in the east London studio he has occupied for over 30 years.
The architect and Academician enthuses over a dish called Heaven and Earth, and tells us why fun is important in architecture.
Over an Italian lunch, the architect and Academician discusses the influence of art and history on his designs.
The quiet minimalist aesthetic of the Academician’s London studio has survived an extraordinary intrusion, he tells us.
Get the vital statistics on the Academician’s studio, his work, and his relationship to the planet.
A classic French bistro delights the Academician, who tells us why the future of the RA belongs to its Friends.