15 Academic Art 1600-1900

Cannibals, Scandals, and Chaos: 6 Surprising Truths About the Birth of the British Art World

We often think of artists as natural rule-breakers, rebels pushing against the establishment. But for a long time, the British art world was the opposite: a place of rigid rules and strict control, dominated by a single, all-powerful institution. This was the era of the Royal Academy. Founded in 1768, it was the ultimate gatekeeper, wielding unparalleled influence over an artist’s career and establishing a virtual monopoly on taste that would not be seriously challenged for a century.

Behind the formal facade of this prestigious institution, however, lies a history filled with shocking scandals, chaotic events, and counter-intuitive truths. It was a world built on surprising foundations and challenged by defiant individuals. Here are six of the most shocking facts about this pivotal era in art history.

1. The World’s Most Prestigious Art Club Was Funded by Ticket Sales

Compared to its European rivals, Britain was a latecomer to the game of establishing a national art academy. The principal reason for this delay was money. While countries like France saw art as a vital state-sponsored propaganda tool, the British government never regarded it as important.

The Royal Academy of Arts was only founded in 1768 because it came with a unique financial model: it was entirely self-financing. King George III agreed to its creation on the condition that it cost him nothing. All of the Academy’s costs, from teaching to facilities, were covered by the admission charge to its annual public exhibition. This simple fact reveals a profound truth about the British establishment’s view of art—it was a private enterprise, not a national priority.

2. A Female Artist’s Self-Portrait Was a Radical Act of Defiance

In 1616, Artemisia Gentileschi became the first woman ever admitted to the Academy of Fine Arts in Florence. Her life was marked by a brutal assault by another artist and a grueling public trial where she, the victim, was tortured to ‘verify’ her testimony. This context makes her powerful self-portraits not just professionally radical, but acts of profound personal survival and assertion. Her work continually challenged the conventions of her time, and none more so than her Self-Portrait as the Allegory of Painting.

The portrait’s most revolutionary act was in its depiction of the artist herself. Gentileschi painted herself not as a refined lady who dabbled in the arts, but as a working professional, physically engaged in her craft, sleeves rolled up and getting dirty. This was a radical departure from the norm. Artists of the era went to great lengths to emphasize the intellectual nature of their work over its physical demands.

Artists during and after the Renaissance were always keen to disassociate themselves from manual work. It was concerned with status, artists wanted to emphasize the intellectual aspect of painting… rather than the manual work of putting paint on canvas. This is a profound message from Gentileschi.

Her self-portrait was a powerful statement on status, intellectualism, and the reality of being a working female artist in a world designed by and for men.

3. All Art Was Judged by a Strict Six-Level Hierarchy

The Royal Academy, under its first president Sir Joshua Reynolds, imposed a rigid hierarchy of genres that defined the importance and moral worth of every painting. The grand purpose of art was seen as intellectual expression, not the “mechanical copying of particular appearance.” This belief was codified into six distinct categories, ranked from most to least important:

1. History painting: A classical or Bible story with a moral point.

2. Portraits: Depictions of a particular person.

3. Genre or subject painting: Humorous scenes, often with a moral.

4. Landscapes: Paintings of particular places.

5. Animal painting: Often mimicking human behavior.

6. Still Life: Considered the least important, suitable for “lady artists as a hobby.”

This hierarchy wasn’t merely an academic exercise; it directly influenced a painting’s price, an artist’s commissions, and their very standing in the social and professional order.

4. A Painting in Modern Clothes Caused a Royal Scandal

In 1770, the American artist Benjamin West decided to push the boundaries of the Academy’s strict hierarchy. His painting, The Death of General Wolfe, depicted a major contemporary historical event—the highest genre of “history painting.” But it ignited a fierce debate that reached the King himself.

The controversy stemmed from West’s decision to paint the figures in their contemporary military uniforms instead of the accepted classical togas. Powerful figures, including the Academy’s own president, Sir Joshua Reynolds, strongly urged West to paint the figures in classical togas, believing modern dress detracted from the event’s timeless heroism. This was seen as a major breach of decorum that compromised the event’s dignity, and the painting was so controversial that King George III refused to purchase it. West defended his artistic choice by stating:

‘the same truth that guides the pen of the historian should govern the pencil [paintbrush] of the artist.’

Despite the initial uproar, the painting eventually overcame all objections. Its success helped inaugurate a move toward greater historical accuracy in painting, forever changing the rules of the genre.

5. Art Exhibitions Were Overcrowded, Chaotic Social Events

Forget the quiet, contemplative galleries we know today. The Royal Academy’s annual Summer Exhibition was a major, chaotic social event—a place “to be seen” as much as to see art. The shows were so popular that, as observer Horace Walpole noted, “The rage to see these exhibitions is so great, that sometimes one cannot pass through the streets were they are”.

Inside, paintings were crammed “frame-to-frame, floor to ceiling.” An artist’s success depended on securing a good spot, ideally “on the line” (at eye level). The crowds were so thick that John Constable began painting his famous “six-footers” simply so they would be large enough to be seen above the throng. The scene was satirized by caricaturist Thomas Rowlandson, who depicted visitors tumbling down the impractical, steep staircase at Somerset House—a perfect metaphor for the chaos and for attendees who were often more interested in other visitors than in the art on the walls.

6. A Founding Member of the Royal Academy Was a Cannibal

Perhaps the most bizarre fact in the Royal Academy’s history concerns Johan Zoffany, a respected German court painter, a key founder of the Academy, and a man buried near his contemporary Thomas Gainsborough. His official biography includes a shocking and macabre detail that stands in stark contrast to his esteemed position.

He is best known as ‘the first and last Royal Academician to have become a cannibal’.

The context for this gruesome distinction is as tragic as it is strange. While returning from India, Zoffany was shipwrecked on the Andaman Islands. As the survivors began to starve, they drew lots to decide who would be sacrificed. A young sailor drew the short straw and was duly eaten. It remains one of the most unsettling and unexpected pieces of trivia in the annals of art history.

Conclusion: The Enduring Power of a Blank Canvas

The story of the British art world’s birth shows that even at its most formal and rule-bound, the world of art has always been filled with human drama, rebellion, and unexpected chaos. The absolute power of the Royal Academy eventually began to fade with the rise of alternative venues like the Grosvenor Gallery, which provided a home for the avant-garde artists the Academy rejected. This constant cycle of establishing rules and then breaking them is what drives art forward.

It makes you wonder: what rigid rules of today’s art world will seem just as strange and surprising 200 years from now?