Friends Events Gallery

Friends Events: Summer 2012

With the Olympic Games ruling out much of August this year, July and September were a busy time for Friends events with an overnight tour, several day excursions and plenty of London-based visits all taking place over the summer months.

Our season began with an overnight trip to Norfolk where we privately toured Sandringham House, the country retreat of Her Majesty the Queen; and Clifton House - the medieval merchant’s house owned by English Heritage Chief Executive Simon Thurley. Both houses proved fascinating and it was wonderful to visit buildings that were still very much lived in, albeit only occasionally!

Some of our most notable day excursions this summer included visits to Wilton House, owned by the 18th Earl of Pembroke and home to an outstanding art collection; Boughton House, a Tudor manor house which was transformed into a vision of Louis XIV’s Versailles and again home to a magnificent collection of paintings, furniture and porcelain. We also arranged visits to Restoration House in Kent; Chenis Manor in Buckinghamshire; and Whitchurch Silkmill and Sandham Memorial Chapel with its paintings by Stanley Spencer RA. We were also privileged to tour three Oxford Colleges with architectural historian Roger White where by special arrangement we examined Magdalen College’s collection of architectural drawings which included work by Hawksmoor and Pugin.

In London, we spent several summer evenings in Hampstead exploring Fenton House and Keats House, with the latter including a poetry reading with the RA’s poet-in-residence Pele Cox. Other evening events were held at Malplaquet House, a private home with a fascinating collection of paintings and sculptures; the Bank of England; Leighton House; and Deutsche Bank.

Our day trips around London during the summer included private tours at Highgate Cemetery; Charterhouse, Marlborough House; Chartered Accountants Hall and the Foundling Museum. Another highlight of the summer was our visit to Two Temple Place, the London home and office of William Waldof Astor in 1895 which proved to be a fascinating architectural gem.

Our Autumn programme of events is now in full swing, the year culminating with the Friends Christmas Carol Service at St James’s Piccadilly on 11 December – we hope to see you there!

Meet the Artist: Hughie O'Donoghue RA

A number of our Friends of the Royal Academy recently had the opportunity to meet one of our Royal Academicians, Hughie O'Donoghue on the evening of Tuesday 28th August 2012.

Having entered a competition through the Friends RA Magazine insert and the Friends of the Royal Academy website, the winning 10 entries were invited to hear Hughie speak on his exhibition Painting/Memory 29 August - 14 October 2012 in the Weston Rooms.

Hughie O'Donoghue RA is the fifth to exhibit in the Artists’ Laboratory series, an annual programme of exhibitions providing Royal Academicians with the opportunity to explore new ideas within their artistic practice whilst simultaneously enabling the public to view and engage with the less familiar aspects of their work.

The Artists’ Laboratory is a space funded by the Friends of the Royal Academy and we would like to thank all our Friends for their continued support.

Hughie O’Donoghue, 'Vulcano: Solfatara III', 2012. Oil on linen canvas. 187 x 253 cm. © the artist, courtesy Marlborough Fine Art.

Friends Events: Spring 2012

A total of 30 events were organised between April and June as part of the Spring Friends Events Programme. We optimistically envisaged lovely sunny days bounding through the countryside, however, despite the weatherman’s lack of co-operation, Friends events continue to thrive and we have had many interesting and successful tours over the past few months.

Some of our most notable day excursions this Spring included visits to Kelmscott Manor, the country home of William Morris; Great Dixter, where we were privileged to tour the private rooms designed by Edwin Lutyens RA; and The Homewood, a modernist house in Surrey owned by the National Trust which opened exclusively to RA Friends.

Closer to home, our London-based tours included visits to The Savile Club, the private members club where Thomas Hardy and Rudyard Kipling were once members; BBC Broadcasting House where we learnt about its iconic Art Deco design and saw sculptures by Eric Gill; and our annual visit to Temple Church and Middle Temple where the ‘Reverend and Valiant Master of the Temple’ Robin Griffith-Jones so generously entertained us with stories of the Church and the Knights Templar.
A final highlight in our Spring Programme was our four-day tour to Yorkshire, where we arranged special visits to the new Hepworth Wakefield Gallery and the Yorkshire Sculpture Park; to the privately owned medieval house Markenfield Hall; and to the magnificent Castle Howard, Burton Agnes Hall and Harewood House.

There are no Friends events planned during the Olympics but there are plenty in July and from September onwards and we hope to see you there!

Middle Temple