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May 11, 2023

RA Schools Show 2023

Mary Stephenson, Deep Pool, 2022. Oil on canvas, 90 × 200 cm. Photo: Tom Carter.

Mary Stephenson, Deep Pool, 2022. Oil on canvas, 90 × 200 cm. Photo: Tom Carter.

Having completed their postgraduate studies at the Royal Academy Schools, fourteen artists transform their studios to present new work across a range of media. Essential to the Royal Academy since its foundation, the RA Schools provides a postgraduate program in contemporary art that is free for all participating students. The RA Schools Show 2023 provides an opportunity to see bold new forms and ideas that result from three years of intense study.

Artworks on display include large-scale paintings where the figure in the foreground creates a sense of vertigo, a digital manipulation and animation that brings sculptures to life, a gigantic hanging mobile made from wood pulp, music-influenced performances that make and break multiple selves, and a purring sculpture that permeate the space.

Works are displayed throughout the RA Schools’ studios and various sites throughout the Royal Academy by the following artists:

Motunrayo Akinola (b. 1990s) is a multidisciplinary artist thinking through ownership of self and territories.

Nancy Allen (b. 1992, Cambridge, England) previously studied at Wimbledon College of Art. Working predominantly with sculpture and drawing, Allen's works contain and embrace.

Daria Blum (b.1992, Lucerne, Switzerland) previously studied at Central Saint Martins. Blum uses choreography and the seductiveness of pop music to suggest how "breaking character" can destabilise entrenched forms of engagement with the world.

Max Boyla (b. 1991, Musselburgh, Scotland) previously studied at Gray's School of Art, Robert Gordon University. Across a cosmos of personal and cultural hauntings, Max Boyla creates space for the viewer to consider the role of the artist, the malleability of symbols, and the dimensional limitations of perception.

Daniel Davies (b. 1992, Blackpool, England) previously studied at Northumbria University. The condensing of ideas in the atmosphere falling visibly in front of you as artworks in a room.

Enej Gala (b. 1990, Ljubljana, Slovenia) previously studied at Accademia di Belle Arti, Venice. Gala's practice is based on an acute awareness of thinking through making as an attempt to grasp the experience of otherness.

Anna Higgins (b. 1991, Melbourne, Australia) is a British–Australian artist who previously studied at the Victorian College of the Arts. Higgins’ expanded image-based practice incorporates found archival and contemporary material, as well as her own images, which are abstracted and recontextualized through collage, painting, drawing, and film photography to form new perceptions and poetic interpretations

Rachel Hobkirk (b. 1995, Scotland) previously studied at Glasgow School of Art. Predominately a painter, Hobkirk's ongoing Doll series satiate a personal need for the artist to recollect memories from her adolescence. By using the trope of the doll, she explores her own sense of autonomy as a woman, passing traces of herself to object surrogates.

Clark Keatley (b. 1987, Gloucester, England) previously studied at Camberwell College of Art. Clark makes images and objects which render idiosyncratic observations of cultural landscapes

Louis Morlæ (b. 1992, Melbourne, Australia). Louis Morlæ's practice uses digital rendering, design, and manufacturing processes to produce sculpture, video, and installation.

Thirza Smith (b. 1997, London) previously studied at Goldsmiths, University of London. His work uses traditional methods of creating, pointing more toward a craft aesthetic.

Elinor Stanley (b. 1992, London) previously studied at Glasgow School of Art. Stanley uses painting to amplify and heighten experience; the figurative focus of a painting shifts as a confused eye might.

Mary Stephenson (b.1989, London) previously studied at Glasgow School of Art. While exuding a mood of tension and apprehension, Stephenson's canvases are simultaneously undercut with a distinctive, dark comedy.

Oliver Tirré (b. 1989) lives and works in London. Previously studied at Nottingham Trent University. Tirré's practice questions ideas of making, where the edge of an object lays, and looks at modes of production.

RA Schools Show 2023 is free to the public with no booking required, June 8–25 June, 2023 to experience a wide range of practice from performance, installation, and moving image to sculpture, painting, and print.

Motunrayo AkinolaNancy AllenDaria BlumMax BoylaDaniel DaviesEnej GalaAnna HigginsRachel HobkirkClark KeatleyLouis MorlæThirza SmithElinor StanleyMary StephensonOliver Tirré

The Royal Academy Schools is an independent school of contemporary art that offers up to seventeen artists each year the opportunity to participate in a free, three-year postgraduate program.

Founded in 1769, the RA Schools remains independent to this day. This independence enables the postgraduate program to constantly adapt to the individual needs of each student. Discussion and debate is fuelled by a variety of lectures, artist talks, group critiques, and tutorials given by leading contemporary artists, Royal Academicians, critics, writers, and theorists.

Graduates of the RA Schools include Lynette Yiadom-Boakye, Michael Armitage, Eddie Peake, Prem Sahib, Rebecca Ackroyd and Ayo Akingbade, and stretch back to William Blake and JMW Turner.