I've visited the Royal Academy of Arts Summer Exhibition for at least 30 years (usually sneaking in multiple visits) and it's always a highlight of my year.

Naturally I was planning to go this year, but then lockdown came & the doors of the academy were shuttered.

Thankfully they rescheduled it (renamed the Winter Exhibition) and I booked my ticket still eager to go...and then lockdown 2 loomed.

As soon as I knew we were going to be stuck in, for who knows how many months, I half-heartedly checked online for tickets discovering there was a lone one left for the only day I could go...

I wasn't sure if it was wise to risk a trip on public transport into central London for such a frivolous thing, but the thought of the long, dark months ahead, and the need to do something fun & have an escape for a bit from 'real life' & the 100+ hour work weeks I have, made me realise how important this was for my mental health and that this trip would be good for me in many ways.

On the day, notwithstanding panic attacks about it all, I was eager to go and, full from my lunch out (see previous post), I was excited to soak it all up.

The exhibition this year was different than any other year, and especially those of my youth, with less etchings & Lino-cuts of otters & dormice, and more work from, featuring, and about, a wider range of voices, people, lives & backgrounds, and the better it was for it.

Another noticeable difference was that there were a good 20% fewer exhibits than last year, but this wasn't felt as a loss. Instead it meant there was more physical space around items, and paintings weren't hung so high up it was hard to see them. Obviously I love getting to see as much as possible but it was interesting the difference the numbers made.
But the main difference was how people acted. It was obvious that others were moving through as slowly I was. Perhaps we were all aware of this being our last chance to experience something like this for potentially months, and we were all soaking it in as much as possible.

That visual nourishment and immersion in the art, has to sustain us for a long time but here's to visiting it in 2021 and seeing what changes the new year brings us...