Summer Exhibition 2014

The Royal Academy of Arts’ annual Summer Exhibition heralds the start of the British summer season. As the world’s largest open submission exhibition it provides a unique platform for emerging and established artists to showcase their works to an international audience, comprising a range of media from painting to printmaking, photography, sculpture, architecture and film. 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, will make a selection to hang on the walls of the Main Galleries in Burlington House. For the first time, artists have submitted their works digitally for the initial round of judging. Over 1,200 artworks will go on display, the majority of which will be for sale offering visitors an opportunity to purchase original artwork by high profile and up-and-coming artists.

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 will be 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.

Other highlights will include a room curated by sculptor Cornelia Parker RA. Focussing 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 will be creating new works specifically for this room.

The ever-popular Architecture Room will be hung by Royal Academicians Richard MacCormac and Eric Parry; the Print Room will be overseen by Chris Orr and Emma Stibbon; and John Maine will arrange a room dedicated to sculpture. The Summer Exhibition 2014 will also feature 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).

One of the founding principles of the Royal Academy of Arts was to 'mount an annual exhibition open to all artists of distinguished merit' to finance the training of young artists in the Royal Academy Schools. The Summer Exhibition has been held every year without interruption since 1769 and continues to play a significant part in raising funds to finance the current students of the RA Schools, who pay no fees for the duration of their studies.

This year, the Royal Academy will be working in partnership with BBC Arts to create a broad range of coverage on TV, radio and online about the Summer Exhibition 2014.