The Royal Academy Exhibition of 1813 was the annual Summer Exhibition or the British Royal Academy of Arts. It was held at Somerset House in London between 3 May and 26 June 1813 and featured many of the leading painters, sculptors and architects of the Regency era. Over seventy two thousand visitors attended the Exhibition. [1]
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It was held at a time when the Peninsular War turned sharply in favour of Britain and it's Allies. The leading portraitist of the period Thomas Lawrence featured prominent military figures Thomas Graham and his Portrait of Sir Charles Stewart alongside the Portrait of the Marquess Wellesley depicting the Anglo-Irish politician and elder brother of Lord Wellington. Both William Beechey and George Francis Joseph submitted portraits of former Prime Minister Spencer Perceval who had been assassinated the previous year.
J.M.W. Turner sent in two paintings, one Frosty Morning , was inspired by a coach journey he had taken through Northern England. The other The Deluge was a biblical landscape painting. One of the most acclaimed works was the Scottish artist David Wilkie's Blind-Man's Buff , a genre piece commissioned by the Prince Regent. [2] Wilkie was able to secure a good position for the work as he served on the hanging committee. [3] Edward Bird, a key figure in the Bristol School of artists, displayed a series of paintings depicting the activities and arrest of a poacher. [4] The American Samuel Morse displayed the large Dying Hercules which received critical praise. [5] The exhibition coincided with a popular respective of the paintings of Joshua Reynolds British Institution which drew some attention away from it. The Royal Academy Exhibition of 1814 the following year was the first to be held following the abdication of Napoleon.
