Viewing RA Summer Exhibition 2025

It’s that time of year again! The annual Summer Exhibition 2025 returns to the Royal Academy for its 257th year, with its vast array of an immense 1,700 contemporary artworks by amateur and professional artists alike. This year’s selection was led by architect Farshid Moussavi, RA, and a committee of RA artists: Tom Emerson and Stephanie Macdonald, Vanessa Jackson, Christopher Le Brun, Sikelela Owen, Helen Sear, Caragh Thuring and Richard Wilson. Each artist is responsible for curating a room. All the works are selected from an open submission.

Part of the fun of course is that this is a selling show – and proceeds from sales go to support the future of the RA (who receive no government funding), as well as to the exhibiting artists. Prices start at less than £250, meaning there’s something to suit almost every budget from budding collector to connoisseur.

Highlights this year include a fun-filled large-scale installation by Ryan Gander welcoming visitors as they arrive in the courtyard, with its 3-metre inflatable balls, and new paintings by Tracey Emin. You’ll spot prints, photographs, paintings, sculptures and much more – all united, loosely, under a theme of ‘dialogues’.