The Royal Society of Marine Artists (RSMA), the society of artists dedicated to depicting tidal waters and the marine environment, has announced the dates of its Annual Exhibition at Mall Galleries in London.

Leaving the Amber Pacific. Image: Tony Williams

The exhibition this year will open on 19 September at 10am and run until 28 September at 5pm. Purchase and enjoy the best in contemporary marine art, with work by selected artists hung alongside the work of current members.

Britain is an island nation; its frontiers lie where the sea begins. The sea in its power and beauty touches us all and offers an infinite variety of subjects for the artist’s attention. The whole world of the sea is here in this year’s Annual Exhibition – great sailing ships, the darkened waters of war, casual and carefree beach scenes, and images of working vessels on river and ocean.

John Scott Martin, the President of the Royal Society of Marine Artists said; “The tradition of marine painting includes many of the greatest names in British art. Of the artists represented at this year’s exhibition, some may in the future be listed historically as nationally and globally important.”

The Annual Exhibition will show figurative paintings, hand-crafted prints, sculpture, ceramics and textiles from both RSMA members and carefully selected work from an Open Submission. Marine artists worldwide are invited to submit work which will be curated according to the society’s foremost measure of excellence in representing tidal waters and subject matter connected to the sea and the marine environment. The majority of the work to be shown at the exhibition will be available for sale with many pieces expected to sell in advance through the Online Preview, as it has in previous years.  Several prizes and awards are on offer to exhibiting artists.

The RSMA’s inaugural exhibition was postponed by the start of the Second World War, and it wasn’t until November 1946 that the long-awaited exhibition took place. Featuring over 100 oil paintings and some 70 watercolours, the exhibition was opened by A. V. Alexander, the new Minister of Defence and former First Lord of the Admiralty. Many fine marine artists, with a national or international reputation, were numbered among the early membership: Montague Dawson, Rowland Hilder, Claude Muncaster, Charles Pears, Norman Wilkinson and Harold Wyllie to name but a few.

Geoff Hunt, King George III visits HMS Victory, 25 April 1778_, oil, 56 x 76 cm

In 1966 Her Majesty the Queen granted the Society the title “Royal Society of Marine Artists”. The Society is firmly committed to the promotion of marine art in its many forms and guises, with the subject matter gradually broadening to encompass not only sea-going vessels, but yachts and dinghies, the coast and sea-shore, harbours, estuaries and tidal rivers – indeed anything that is essentially marine related. The society has a strong association with the Royal Navy and works by early members are held in collections such as those of the Imperial War Museum and the National Maritime Museum. Members have recorded celebratory events such as the Silver Jubilee Fleet Review of 1977 and the International Fleet Review of 2005, and in 2013 two members were granted permission to paint the new carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth whilst still under construction at the Rosyth Shipyard in Scotland.

Work can be purchased online from Mall Galleries’ website: https://www.mallgalleries.org.uk/exhibitions-events/royal-society-marine-artists-annual-exhibition-2024, or in person at the exhibition

Time: 10am – 5pm

Location: North, East, and West Galleries, Mall Galleries, London

Admission: £5 (Free for Friends of Mall Galleries and under 25s, concessions available) Booking is not required

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