RA Summer Exhibition

This year the Royal Academy received 12,000 entries, from which the hanging committee of Royal Academicians led by Hughie O’Donoghue, the coordinator of the Summer Exhibition 2014, made a selection to hang on the walls of the Main Galleries in Burlington House.

Architecture plays an important part in this year’s exhibition. 140 works have been selected and hung by the architect Eric Parry RA after some early dialogue from Sir Richard MacCormac CBE RA. Focusing on the development of designs and exploration of ideas during the process of conceiving and designing buildings, Parry puts equal emphasis on incomplete or theoretical projects as completed projects. Newly elected Royal Academicians Thomas Heatherwick and Louisa Hutton are represented in the Architecture Room and the Central Hall; Heatherwick presents a model of his Bombay Sapphire Gin Distillery, while Hutton, from the Berlin-based practice Sauerbruch Hutton, presents two prints of her designs for M9 Museum in the old city centre of Mestre and Immanuel Church in Cologne.

Other highlights include a room curated by sculptor Cornelia Parker RA. Focusing on the theme of black and white, Cornelia Parker has invited Royal Academicians Michael Craig-Martin, Richard Deacon, Tacita Dean, and Michael Landy to exhibit works, as well as other high-profile artists such as Martin Creed, Jeremy Deller, Mona Hatoum, Christian Marclay, Laure Prouvost and David Shrigley. Many of the artists created new works specifically for this room.

In the past year, the Royal Academy has elected a record-number of Members, creating a new generation of Royal Academicians. To celebrate this renewal of the Membership, there is a dedicated room for the display of works by newly elected Academicians, who include Thomas Heatherwick, Neil Jeffries, Chantal Joffe, Tim Shaw, Conrad Shawcross, Yinka Shonibare, Bob and Roberta Smith and Wolfgang Tillmans amongst others, and also newly elected Honorary Academicians, such as El Anatsui, Marlene Dumas and Rosemarie Trockel.

The Print Room is overseen by Chris Orr and Emma Stibbon; and John Maine arranged a room dedicated to sculpture. The Summer Exhibition 2014 also features works in memory of the Royal Academicians John Bellany (1942 – 2013), Ralph Brown (1928 – 2013), Sir Anthony Caro (1924 – 2013), Maurice Cockrill (1936 – 2013) and Alan Davie (1920 – 2014).

until August 17, 2014
Architecture at the RA Summer Exhibition 2014
Royal Academy of Art
Burlington House
Piccadilly, London