The National Academy of Design is an honorary association of American

artist An artist is a person engaged in an activity related to creating art, practicing the arts, or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse refers to a practitioner in the visual arts only. However, th ...

s, founded in New York City in 1825 by Samuel Morse,

Asher Durand Asher Brown Durand (August 21, 1796, – September 17, 1886) was an American painter of the Hudson River School. Early life Durand was born in, and eventually died in, Maplewood, New Jersey (then called Jefferson Village). He was the eighth ...

, Thomas Cole, Martin E. Thompson,

Charles Cushing Wright Charles Cushing Wright (born 1 May 1796, in Damariscotta, Maine, died 7 June 1857, in New York City) was an American engraver and medalist. In 1825 he was a founding member of the National Academy of Design. Art Wright was first apprenticed to a ...

, Ithiel Town, and others "to promote the fine arts in America through instruction and exhibition." Membership is limited to 450 American artists and architects, who are elected by their peers on the basis of recognized excellence.

History

The original founders of the National Academy of Design were students of the American Academy of the Fine Arts. However, by 1825 the students of the American Academy felt a lack of support for teaching from the academy, its board composed of merchants, lawyers, and physicians, and from its unsympathetic president, the painter

John Trumbull John Trumbull (June 6, 1756November 10, 1843) was an American artist of the early independence period, notable for his historical paintings of the American Revolutionary War, of which he was a veteran. He has been called the "Painter of the Rev ...

. Samuel Morse and other students set about forming "the drawing association", to meet several times each week for the study of the art of design. Still, the association was viewed as a dependent organization of the American Academy, from which they felt neglected. An attempt was made to reconcile differences and maintain a single academy by appointing six of the artists from the association as directors of the American Academy. When four of the nominees were not elected, however, the frustrated artists resolved to form a new academy and the National Academy of Design was born. Morse had been a student at the

Royal Academy The Royal Academy of Arts (RA) is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly in London. Founded in 1768, it has a unique position as an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects. Its pur ...

in London and emulated its structure and goals for the National Academy of Design. The mission of the academy, from its foundation, was to "promote the fine arts in America through exhibition and education."Historical Overview
National Academy of Design. In 2015, the academy struggled with financial hardship. In the next few years, it closed its museum and art school, and created an endowment through the sale of its New York real estate holdings. Today, the academy advocates for the arts as a tool for education, celebrates the role of artists and architects in public life, and serves as a catalyst for cultural conversations that propel society forward. According to the academy, its 450 National Academicians "are professional artists and architects who are elected to membership by their peers annually."

Official names

After three years and some tentative names, in 1828 the academy found its longstanding name "National Academy of Design", under which it was known to one and a half centuries. In 1997, newly appointed director Annette Blaugrund rebranded the institution as the "National Academy Museum and School of Fine Art", to reflect "a new spirit of integration incorporating the association of artists, museum, and school", and to avoid confusion with the now differently understood term " design". This change was reversed in 2017. * 1825 The New York Drawing Association * 1826 The National Academy of The Arts of Design * 1828 The National Academy of Design * 1997 The National Academy Museum and School of Fine Art * 2017 The National Academy of Design

Locations

The academy occupied several locations in Manhattan over the years. Notable among them was a building on Park Avenue and 23rd Street designed by architect P. B. Wight and built 1863–1865 in a Venetian Gothic style modeled on the

Doge's Palace The Doge's Palace ( it, Palazzo Ducale; vec, Pałaso Dogal) is a palace built in Venetian Gothic style, and one of the main landmarks of the city of Venice in northern Italy. The palace was the residence of the Doge of Venice, the supreme auth ...

Venice Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 ...

. Another location was at West 109th Street and Amsterdam Avenue.Cassell, Dewey, with Aaron Sultan and Mike Gartland. ''The Art of George Tuska'' ( TwoMorrows Publishing, 2005), , p. 10 From 1906 to 1941, the academy occupied the American Fine Arts Society building at 215 West 57th Street. From 1942 to 2019, the academy occupied a mansion on

Fifth Avenue Fifth Avenue is a major and prominent thoroughfare in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It stretches north from Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village to West 143rd Street in Harlem. It is one of the most expensive shopping stre ...

and Eighty-ninth Street, the former home of sculptor Anna Hyatt Huntington and

philanthropist Philanthropy is a form of altruism that consists of "private initiatives, for the Public good (economics), public good, focusing on quality of life". Philanthropy contrasts with business initiatives, which are private initiatives for private goo ...

Archer M. Huntington, who donated the house in 1940. Currently, the National Academy of Design shares offices and galleries with the

National Arts Club The National Arts Club is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit and members club on Gramercy Park, Manhattan, New York City. It was founded in 1898 by Charles DeKay, an art and literary critic of the ''New York Times'' to "stimulate, foster, and promote public ...

located inside the historic Samuel J. Tilden House, 14-15 Gramercy Park South.

Organization and activities

National Academy School of Fine Arts (48237025902)

The academy is a professional honorary organization, with a school and a museum. One cannot apply for membership, which since 1994, after many changes in numbers, is limited to 450 American artists and architects. Instead, members are elected by their peers on the basis of recognized excellence. Full members of the National Academy are identified by the post-nominal "NA" (National Academician), associates by "ANA". At the heart of the National Academy is their ever-growing collection. Academicians choose and contribute a work of their own creation, building upon the academy's distinguished legacy. Today, their permanent collection totals over 8,000 works and tells a singular history of American art and architecture as constructed by its creators. The Academy organizes major exhibitions and loans their works to leading institutions around the world, in addition to providing resources that foster scholarship across disciplines.

Notable instructors

Among the teaching staff were numerous artists, including

Will Hicok Low Will Hicok Low (March 31, 1853November 27, 1932) or Will Hicock Low was an American artist, muralist, and writer on art. Biography He was born at Albany, New York. In 1873 he entered the atelier of Jean-Léon Gérôme in the École des Beaux Art ...

, who taught from 1889 to 1892. Another was Charles Louis Hinton, whose long tenure started in 1901. The famous American poet William Cullen Bryant also gave lectures. Architect Alexander Jackson Davis taught at the academy. Painter Lemuel Wilmarth was the first full-time instructor.

Silas Dustin Silas Dustin (1855 – 1940) was an artist, art dealer and curator of the National Academy of Design in New York Biography Dustin was born in Richmond, Ohio although he is known as a California painter. He studied under William Merritt Chase in Ne ...

was a curator.

Notable members

Annual Reception at the National Academy of Design, New York

* Marina Abramović *

Benjamin Abramowitz Benjamin Abramowitz (also known as "Ben Hoffman" during the late 1930s and early 1940s) was an American painter, printmaker, and sculptor. First recognized for his contribution at age 19 as senior artist with the Federal Art Project of the Work ...

* James Henry Beard * Edwin Blashfield * William Jay Bolton * Lee Bontecou *

Stanley Boxer Stanley Boxer (1926-May 8, 2000) was an American artist best known for thickly painted abstract works of art. He was also an accomplished sculptor and printmaker. He received awards from the Guggenheim Fellowship and the National Endowment for ...

* Walker O. Cain * John F. Carlson * Vija Celmins * William Merritt Chase *

Frederic Edwin Church Frederic Edwin Church (May 4, 1826 – April 7, 1900) was an American landscape painter born in Hartford, Connecticut. He was a central figure in the Hudson River School of American landscape painters, best known for painting large landscapes, ...

* Chuck Close * Thomas Cole * Colin Campbell Cooper * Leon Dabo *

Cyrus Dallin Cyrus Edwin Dallin (November 22, 1861 – November 14, 1944) was an American sculptor best known for his depictions of Native Americans. He created more than 260 works, including the ''Equestrian Statue of Paul Revere'' in Boston, Massac ...

William Parsons Winchester Dana William Parsons Winchester Dana (18 February 1833 – 8 April 1927) was an American artist who settled in France. Later he emigrated to London, and became a naturalised British Subject. His paintings were generally small, painted with oils on can ...

Charles Harold Davis Charles Harold Davis (7 January 1856 – 5 August 1933) was an American landscape painter. Biography He was born at Amesbury, Massachusetts. A pupil of the schools of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, he was sent to Paris in 1880. Having studi ...

* Henry Golden Dearth * Jose de Creeft * Richard Diebenkorn *

William Henry Drake Sir William Henry Drake, , (29 September 1812 – 28 January 1882) was a British public servant and Colonial Treasurer of Western Australia. Drake was the son of John Drake of Exmouth, Devon, Deputy Commissary-General, by Maria, daughter of Geor ...

* Thomas Eakins *

Lydia Field Emmet Lydia Field Emmet (January 23, 1866 – August 16, 1952) was an American artist best known for her work as a portraitist. She studied with, among others, prominent artists such as William Merritt Chase, Harry Siddons Mowbray, Kenyon Cox and To ...

* Herbert Ferber * Bruce Fowle * Helen Frankenthaler * Gilbert Franklin *

Daniel Chester French Daniel Chester French (April 20, 1850 – October 7, 1931) was an American sculptor of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, best known for his 1874 sculpture ''The Minute Man'' in Concord, Massachusetts, and his 1920 monume ...

* Frederick Carl Frieseke * Sonia Gechtoff *

Frank Gehry Frank Owen Gehry, , FAIA (; ; born ) is a Canadian-born American architect and designer. A number of his buildings, including his private residence in Santa Monica, California, have become world-renowned attractions. His works are considered ...

Paul Georges Paul Gordon Georges (June 15, 1923 – April 16, 2002) was an American painter. He painted large-scale figurative allegories and numerous self-portraits. In January 1966, the cover of ''Art News'' featured Georges' painting ''In The Studio'' ...

Arthur Hill Gilbert Arthur Hill Gilbert (June 10, 1893 – April 1970http://www.genealogybank.com/gbnk/ssdi/doc/news/112D8289724F81D4) was an American Impressionist painter, notable as one of the practitioners of the California-style. Today, he is remembered for ...

* Aaron Goodelman * Hardie Gramatky * Horatio Greenough * Red Grooms *

Armin Hansen Armin Hansen (1886–1957), a native of San Francisco, was a prominent American painter of the en plein air school, best known for his marine canvases. His father Herman Wendelborg Hansen was also a famous artist of the American West. The young ...

* L. Birge Harrison *

Edward Lamson Henry Edward Lamson Henry (January 12, 1841May 9, 1919), commonly known as E.L. Henry, was an American genre painter, born in Charleston, South Carolina. Early life Though born in Charleston, by age seven his parents had died and Henry moved to live ...

* Itshak Holtz * Winslow Homer *

Cecil de Blaquiere Howard Cecil de Blaquiere Howard, sometimes Cecil Howard, (April 2, 1888 – September 5, 1956), born in Clifton, Welland County, Ontario, Canada (today Niagara Falls) was an American painter and sculptor. The sculptor devoted his work to the presentat ...

* George Inness * Jasper Johns *

Frank Tenney Johnson Frank Tenney Johnson (June 26, 1874 – January 1, 1939) was a painter of the Old American West, and he popularized a style of painting cowboys which became known as "The Johnson Moonlight Technique". ''Somewhere on the Range'' is an examp ...

* Lester Johnson * Wolf Kahn * Charles Keck * Ellsworth Kelly * Greta Kempton * Everett Raymond Kinstler * Chaim Koppelman * Leo Lentelli * Emanuel Leutze * Hayley Lever * Maya Lin * Frank Lobdell * Evelyn Beatrice Longman * Frederick William Macmonnies * Knox Martin * Jervis McEntee * Michael Mazur *

Gari Melchers Julius Garibaldi Melchers (August 11, 1860 – November 30, 1932) was an American artist. He was one of the leading American proponents of Naturalism (art), naturalism. He won a 1932 Gold medal from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Bio ...

* Alme Meyvis *

Raoul Middleman Raoul Middleman (1935 – October 29, 2021) was an American painter known for his "provocatively prolific work--primarily traditional, including figure studies, landscapes, and still lifes--and for being a megawatt personality."McCabe, Bret. ...

* F. Luis Mora * Henry Siddons Mowbray *

John Mulvany John Mulvany (c. 1839 – 1906) was an Irish born American artist best known as an artist of the American West who painted the first large (11ftx21ft) image of General Custer’s defeat by the Oglala Sioux Indians at Little Big Horn in 1876. ...

David Dalhoff Neal David Dalhoff Neal (October 20, 1838May 2, 1915), was an American artist. Early years David Dalhoff Neal was born to father Stephen Bryant Neal and mother Mary (Dalhoff) Neal, on Middlesex Street, in Lowell, Massachusetts. His grandparents were ...

* Victor Nehlig * Eliot Noyes *

Kate Orff Kate Orff, RLA, FASLA, is the founding principal of SCAPE, a design-driven landscape architecture and urban design studio based in New York. She also is the director the Urban Design Program (MSAUD) at Columbia University, Columbia University's ...

Tom Otterness Tom Otterness (born 1952) is an American sculptor best known as one of America's most prolific public artists. Otterness's works adorn parks, plazas, subway stations, libraries, courthouses and museums around the world, notably in New York Cit ...

* William Page * Philip Pearlstein * I. M. Pei * John Thomas Peele * Judy Pfaff * Renzo Piano *

William Lamb Picknell William Lamb Picknell (October 23, 1853 – August 8, 1897) was an American painter of landscapes, coastal views, and figure genres, known for his rapid painting style. He was born in Hinesburg, Vermont and died in Marblehead, Massachusetts. ...

* Albin Polasek * Alfred Easton Poor * John Portman * Alexander Phimister Proctor * Harvey Quaytman *

Andrew Raftery Andrew Stein Raftery (born May 22, 1962, in Goldsboro, North Carolina) is an American artist and educator, known for his paintings, burin engravings, and drawings on fictional and autobiographical narratives of contemporary American life. Biog ...

Robert Rauschenberg Milton Ernest "Robert" Rauschenberg (October 22, 1925 – May 12, 2008) was an American painter and graphic artist whose early works anticipated the Pop art movement. Rauschenberg is well known for his Combines (1954–1964), a group of artwor ...

Benjamin Franklin Reinhart Benjamin Franklin Reinhart (1829 – May 3, 1885) was an American painter born near Waynesburg, Pennsylvania, known for his genre, historical, and portrait paintings. Biography Reinhart studied at the National Academy of Design in New York fr ...

* Paul Resika *

Priscilla Roberts Priscilla Roberts (1916–2001) was an American artist known for her still life paintings. She employed a precise style in which fanciful objects were juxtaposed in a manner that was seen to approach surrealism and that was often called mag ...

* Dorothea Rockburne * Norman Rockwell *

Mario Romañach Mario Romañach (1917–1984) was a Cuban modernist architect, planner, and university professor. Biography Mario Romañach finished his higher studies at the University of Havana and, along with Max Borges Jr., Frank Martinez, Nicolás Quinta ...

* Albert Pinkham Ryder *

Robert Ryman Robert Ryman (May 30, 1930February 8, 2019) was an American painter identified with the movements of monochrome painting, minimalism, and conceptual art. He was best known for abstract, white-on-white paintings. He lived and worked in New York ...

* Augustus Saint-Gaudens *

John Singer Sargent John Singer Sargent (; January 12, 1856 – April 14, 1925) was an American expatriate artist, considered the "leading portrait painter of his generation" for his evocations of Edwardian-era luxury. He created roughly 900 oil paintings and more ...

* Eugene Francis Savage * Emily Maria Scott * Richard Serra *

Susan Louise Shatter Susan Louise Shatter (1943–2011) was an American landscape painter. Shatter painted landscapes in both oil and watercolor, preferring the earth tones of volcanic canyons or rocky coastlines rather than the green pastoral settings more traditio ...

Lorraine Shemesh Lorraine Shemesh is an American artist whose practice focuses on painting, drawing, and ceramics.Goodman, Jonathan. “Lorraine Shemesh at Allan Stone,” ''Art in America'', December 2000, p. 122.Little, Carl. "Lorraine Shemesh at Allan Stone." ...

Elliott Fitch Shepard Elliott Fitch Shepard (July 25, 1833 – March 24, 1893) was a New York lawyer, banker, and owner of the ''Mail and Express'' newspaper, as well as a founder and president of the New York State Bar Association. Shepard was married to Margare ...

* Rhoda Sherbell * Cindy Sherman * William Siegel * Hughie Lee-Smith * Nancy Spero * Frederic Dorr Steele * Theodore Clement Steele * Frank Stella * Arthur Fitzwilliam Tait *

Katharine Lamb Tait Katharine Lamb Tait (3 June 1895 – 11 August 1981) was an American stained glass and mosaics designer, painter, muralist, and illustrator. She was the head designer at J&R Lamb Studios for more than four decades, and created notable commissions ...

* Jesse Talbot *

Reuben Tam Reuben Tam (January 17, 1916 – January 3, 1991) was an American landscape painter, educator, poet and graphic artist. Early life and education He was born in Kapa'a on the Hawaiian island of Kaua'i. He earned a BA degree from the Universi ...

* Henry Ossawa Tanner *

Edmund C. Tarbell Edmund Charles Tarbell (April 26, 1862August 1, 1938) was an American Impressionist painter. A member of the Ten American Painters, his work hangs in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Metropolitan Museum of Art, National Gallery of Art, Smithson ...

* Louis Comfort Tiffany * Cy Twombly * Edward Charles Volkert * Robert Vonnoh * William Guy Wall * John Quincy Adams Ward * Harry Watrous * Carrie Mae Weems *

Stow Wengenroth Stow Wengenroth (1906–1978) was an American artist and lithographer, born in 1906 in Brooklyn, New York. Wengenroth was once called "America's greatest living artist working in black and white" by the American realist painter Andrew Wyeth, and ...

Frederic Whitaker Frederic Whitaker (1891–1980) was an American designer, painter and author. Biography Born in Providence, Rhode Island, Frederic Whitaker began his working career as an apprentice designer with W. J. Feeley and Co., manufacturers of metal-w ...

Carleton Wiggins Carleton Wiggins NA (1848–1932) was an American landscape and cattle painter. He was born in Turner, Orange County, New York,

* Guy Carleton Wiggins * Anita Willets-Burnham * Frank Lloyd Wright * Jimmy Wright * Dorothy Weir Young * Milford Zornes * William Penn Morgan

References

External links

*
Virtual tour of the National Academy of Design
provided by

Google Arts & Culture Google Arts & Culture (formerly Google Art Project) is an online platform of high-resolution images and videos of artworks and cultural artifacts from partner cultural organizations throughout the world. It utilizes high-resolution image technol ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:National Academy Of Design 1825 establishments in New York (state) Art museums established in 1825 Art museums and galleries in New York City Art schools in New York City Design museums in New York (state) Museums in Manhattan Learned societies of the United States Academies of arts Organizations established in 1825 Venetian Gothic architecture in the United States Upper East Side Fifth Avenue 23rd Street (Manhattan) Clubs and societies in New York City