The Royal Academy Schools
Free tuition, an ivory ticket, and a decade of chalk: the English academy where probationers proved themselves unaided, the Antique earned the Life room, and nobody ever graduated, they just won December medals.
The Royal Academy Schools, founded with the Academy in 1768 under Reynolds's presidency, trained by merit and patience. A candidate submitted specimen drawings (by the 1880s, a two-foot rendering of an undraped antique statue) and, if accepted, became a probationer with three months to produce new drawings inside the Schools proving the first were unaided; confirmation brought an engraved ivory pass, the "bone," in use by 1859. Studentships ran six years at first, seven from 1792, ten by 1800, and tuition was free throughout, Reynolds's founding bargain. Training climbed from the Antique School under the Keeper (chalk from the cast collection, seats first-come each week) through compulsory perspective and lectures to the Life School, two hours every evening but Sunday, poses set by a rotating Academician Visitor, with the female nude restricted to students over twenty or married, and women barred from the Life room entirely until 1893. Painting was learned by copying (Dulwich loans from 1815); painting from the live model arrived only in 1847. There were no examinations and no graduation: only the December medals, and, for the best, Rome.
How the system worked
By specimen and probation: submitted drawings (mid-century: an antique statue in chalk, an anatomical figure, a skeleton, plus a recommendation letter; by the 1880s a finished two-foot drawing of an undraped antique). Acceptance made you a probationer with three months to produce a fresh set of drawings inside the Schools, proving the application work unaided. Confirmation brought the engraved ivory admission token, the "bone," documented in use by 1859. Tuition was free.
The Schools inside the Academy: the Keeper ran the Antique School day to day; four professorships (Anatomy, Architecture, Painting, Perspective) each owed six lectures a year; a rotating Academician served as Visitor in the Life School, setting the poses. Somerset House first (the Antique lit by oil lamps), Burlington House later, under proper north light.
Antique until judged competent, plus a completed perspective course and a year's lecture attendance, then the Life School; the School of Painting for most of its first century meant copying Old Masters (with pictures borrowed from Dulwich from 1815), and painting from the live model entered only in 1847. Studentship terms stretched with the syllabus: six years from 1768, seven from 1792, ten by 1800.
None, formally: no examinations, no graduation. Standing was won at the annual competitions, medals and prizes conferred each December, the Gold Medal above all (the 1874 sculpture Gold carried a two-year £25 scholarship), and the travelling scholarship to Rome, funded at £120 a year per the 1839 parliamentary accounts.
The Life School ran two hours every evening except Sunday; the Antique filled the days, with weekly first-come scrambles for the good seats; from 1839 the Professor of Perspective added practical winter classes, 6 to 8 p.m.
The Keeper over the Antique, the Visitor over the Life room, the professors from the lectern, and the founding voice over all of it: Reynolds's Discourses, delivered at the prize-givings, were the Schools' theory of everything.
Free, from 1768 onward: the Academy's exhibitions paid for the Schools. The gate was the probation, not the purse.
The curriculum, in training order
Three months producing a new set of drawings inside the Schools on Council-set subjects, proving the admission portfolio was the candidate's own hand.
Confirmation of studentship, and the ivory bone.
Detailed hatched chalk drawings from the cast collection, the Apollo Belvedere downward, under the Keeper: ideal form, proportion, and light-and-shade as the entry discipline.
Competence at the Antique plus the perspective course plus a year of lectures earned the Life room.
Drawing from male and female models, poses set by the Academician Visitor of the month: the training's prestige stage, and its most rationed (over-twenty-or-married for the female nude in the 18th century; no women students at all until 1893).
Professorial lectures with real dissection: Dr. William Hunter cut for the students in the founding era, and the serious ones drew what they saw, Constable's colored dissection drawings survive.
The School of Painting as copying school: Old Masters, with Dulwich Picture Gallery loans from 1815, the continental practice of painting the live model arriving only in 1847.
Materials, models, and the room
- Chalk, three colors of it. Natural red, black, and white chalks, often aux deux or trois crayons on toned paper, in the porte-crayon Reynolds told students to keep "for ever in your hands."
- The cast collection, plus the flayed horse. Antique and Renaissance casts as the Antique School's syllabus, alongside the anatomical écorchés, including the famous life-size cast of a skinned horse.
- Lamplight, then north light. The Somerset House Antique School worked under oil lamps, dramatic on the casts; Burlington House later gave the Schools proper north-lit rooms.
- The models the record half-names. Early male models included the Academy's own porters (James Dyer, Charles Cranmer); the women were kept anonymous in the books, "the Woman," and paid more than the men, the premium recorded frankly as shame money. Exact rates have not survived.
The people
Who taught
Sir Joshua Reynolds · President 1768-1792
The Discourses, delivered at the December prize-givings, made the Schools' doctrine: the grand style, learned by discipline first.
The Keepers · the standing office
Ran the Antique School daily; Fuseli's long keepership (1804-1825) marked a generation, Blake's among them.
The Visitors · rotating Academicians
A different RA each month setting the Life poses: the Schools' built-in plurality of eyes.
Dr. William Hunter · Professor of Anatomy from 1768
Dissection as curriculum, from the founding.
Who trained here
William Blake · admitted 1779
Took the training and fought the doctrine: his annotations to Reynolds are the Schools' greatest hostile review.
J. M. W. Turner · admitted 1789
Antique to Life to Academician by 26, then Professor of Perspective: the system's complete circuit in one career.
John Constable · admitted 1800
The dissection drawings and the long Antique patience behind the clouds.
Harold Speed · 1890s
Gold medal and travelling scholarship; the Schools' training distilled into his two century-standard books.
The primary record
- Sir Joshua Reynolds, Discourses on Art (1769-1790): the Schools' delivered doctrine.
- The 1839 Hansard accounts of the Royal Academy: the Rome scholarship at £120 a year, the Schools' finances in public record.
- The extant ivory admission token of J. Gallimore, dated 21 December 1859: the "bone" in the flesh.
- Annette Wickham, "Strike a pose: 250 years of life drawing at the Royal Academy of Arts" (2022) and Martin Myrone, "William Blake as a Student of the Royal Academy" (2017): the Life School's mechanics.
Open questions
- Model pay amounts have not survived; only the structure (women paid more, recorded as shame money) is documented.
- Student painting materials are the era's standard rather than a documented Schools requirement.
- The bone's introduction date is unsettled: cited to the 1880s in one source, physically extant from 1859.
Common questions
What were the Royal Academy Schools?
The Royal Academy's free art school, founded with the Academy in 1768: probationary admission, the Antique School under the Keeper, the evening Life School under rotating Academician Visitors, professorial lectures with real dissection, and no examinations or graduation, only the December medals and the Rome scholarship.
How did students get into the RA Schools?
By drawings, twice: a specimen submission (by the 1880s, a finished two-foot chalk of an undraped antique statue) won probationer status, then three months drawing inside the Schools proved the work unaided. Confirmed students received the engraved ivory pass known as the bone. Tuition was free throughout.
How long was a Royal Academy studentship?
Six years at the founding, extended to seven in 1792 and ten by 1800, with progression by judged competence rather than timetable: the Antique until you earned the Life room, lectures and perspective compulsory along the way.
When could students paint from the live model at the RA?
Not until 1847. For its first eight decades the School of Painting taught by copying, including Old Masters borrowed from the Dulwich Picture Gallery from 1815; painting from life was a deliberate, late import of continental practice.
When were women admitted to the RA Schools?
As students, from 1860 onward in limited form, but the Life School stayed closed to them until 1893, and the 18th-century rules had restricted even male students' access to the female nude to those over twenty or married. The Schools' history is inseparable from who was allowed in which room.
Who trained at the Royal Academy Schools?
The spine of English art: Blake (admitted 1779, doctrine's greatest dissenter), Turner (1789, later its Professor of Perspective), Constable (1800), and generations after, including Harold Speed in the 1890s, whose gold-medal training became the era's standard instruction books.
From the stories
The Women Who Paid Double: The Life room opened to women in 1893, with the male model draped: the propriety fight, told across five systems.
Part of the Academies atlas, how painting was actually taught, system by system. The living version of this question: atelier vs online course, and the painters themselves in the Painter Atlas.