Female artists will dominate the Royal Academy of Arts next year, more than a century after their arrival in the institution was denounced as an “invasion”.
Performance artist Marina Abramović will become the first woman to have a dedicated solo show in the main gallery of the RA, while Tracey Emin will bring an exhibition inspired by her love of The Scream painter Edvard Munch.
Artistic director Tim Marlow said the shows, and a third dedicated to founder member Angelica Kauffman, were not chosen on the basis of gender, adding: “The academy, like many institutions, did not do very well in terms of gender but this is not about making up for previous failings.”
Founded in 1768 with only two women members, the RA then went for more than a century without electing a female member and did not admit any women to its schools until 1860. Even then, they were barred from life drawing classes for decades.
In 1860, it admitted Laura Herford by accident after she submitted drawings using her initials rather than her full name — a move described in a 1914 history of the institution as “the invasion”. It was not until 2011 that the academy elected its first female professors, including Emin who became professor of drawing.
Emin approached the RA about putting on a show dedicated to Munch, with whom she has been “in love” since her teenage years, she previously said. Among her earliest works is a one-minute film, called Homage To Edvard Munch And All My Dead Children, which includes footage of her naked and curled up on a jetty in Åsgårdstrand, Norway, where Munch lived.
Mr Marlow said the show next November, which will feature works by both artists, was an Emin/Munch exhibition rather than the other way round. He added: “This is symptomatic of her openness and curiosity that she wanted to do a show that is essentially a conversation with another artist.”
The RA’s 2020 season also includes a major Picasso exhibition, as well as shows examining the work of artists such as Gauguin and Cézanne. The academy — whose past and present members include JMW Turner, Grayson Perry and David Hockney — celebrated its 250th anniversary last year with a major £56 million refurbishment project.
