Models and militants: women in the Life Room

Join Annette Wickham, Curator of Works on Paper at the RA, to uncover the story of women and life drawing and explore the militant campaigns, changing attitudes and evolution of the professional female artist.

Life drawing was the lynchpin of an artist’s training from the Renaissance to the late 20th century. Unless the aspiring artist happened to be a woman, that is. Female students were denied access to the life classes run by academies and art schools for much of this period on the grounds of moral propriety. At some establishments, like the Royal Academy Schools, women would only be found in the Life Room as models, not as artists. This exclusion meant that women had trouble being accepted as professional artists and the situation was only gradually improved from the late 19th century onwards.

This talk will explore the story of women and life drawing, including female artists’ campaigning for access to art education, as well as the changing attitudes towards female models in art schools.