Royal College of Art

Royal College of Art (RCA), London. Britain's pre-eminent training school for artists and designers. Since 1967 it has been a postgraduate university institution, but it has had many changes of status, name, and location since it was founded in 1837 at Somerset House as the School of Design. Originally it was a school of industrial design, the fine arts being the province of the Royal Academy. In 1852 it moved to Marlborough House and was renamed the Central School of Practical Art. It became part of the Government Department of Science and Art in 1853 and in 1857, renamed the National Art Training School, it moved to join the Museum of Ornamental Art (later the Victoria and Albert Museum) in South Kensington. In 1863 it moved to new buildings in Exhibition Road, and in 1896 it was renamed the Royal College of Art by Queen Victoria and allowed to grant diplomas. At this time the principal (or headmaster as the post was sometimes known) was John Sparkes (d. 1907); he was succeeded by Walter Crane, 1897–8, and then by Augustus Spencer (1860–1924), who held the position until 1920.

By the turn of the century the college had turned much more to fine art, away from industrial design, and in 1900 it was divided into four schools: Mural and Decorative Painting; Sculpture and Modelling; Architecture; and Design. The original heads of these schools (who were called ‘instructors', then from 1901 ‘professors') were respectively Gerald Moira (1867–1959), whose work included murals at the Central Criminal Court (Old Bailey) and other public buildings in London; the French-born Edward Lantéri (1848–1917), who was influential in training exponents of the New Sculpture; Beresford Pite (1861–1934), a founder member (1884) of the Art Workers' Guild, which aimed to increase understanding and collaboration between different branches of the visual arts; and W. R. Lethaby, one of the outstanding art educators of his day. Lethaby brought with him several specialist teachers, most notably Edward Johnston (1872–1944), the celebrated calligrapher, who taught writing and illumination at the RCA for almost 40 years. Among the other distinguished and long-serving teachers was Frank Short, who was in charge of etching from 1891 to 1924.

Spencer was followed as principal by William Rothenstein, 1920–35, whose conservative values were highly influential, and he was succeeded by Percy Jowett, 1935–47. During the Second World War the RCA was relocated to Ambleside in the Lake District, 1940–5. This interlude was well managed on the whole, but by the time of its return to London the college had become somewhat stagnant. It was given new life by Robin Darwin, who was head from 1948 to 1971 (in 1967 his title changed from principal to rector). Darwin introduced many new departments, including fashion design and photography, aligned the college more closely with industry (he aimed to ‘provide courses of a thoroughly practical nature in all primary industrial fields'), and revitalized the teaching staff (he said that when he joined ‘two of the five professors were alleged not to have exhanged a word for fifteen years'). His overall concern was to make the RCA a ‘magnet for talent'. It was during Darwin's long period in charge that the college moved to its present home, a new eight-storey building in Kensington Gore (1961), and that it was given a Royal Charter and empowered to award degrees (1967).

Although the RCA had some highly illustrious students early in the 20th century, most notably Barbara Hepworth and Henry Moore, its golden age is usually reckoned to fall within Darwin's period in charge. In 1987 Christopher Frayling (1946– ), professor of cultural history at the college (he became rector in 1996), published The Royal College of Art: One Hundred & Fifty Years of Art & Design, in which he named the period ‘roughly 1948–1968’ as ‘the days … when the RCA couldn't do anything wrong if it tried'. Its absolute peak of esteem perhaps came in the late 1950s and early 1960s with the generation of students who were largely responsible for launching British Pop art— Derek Boshier, David Hockney, Allen Jones, R. B. Kitaj, Peter Phillips (see YOUNG CONTEMPORARIES).