Royal Academy Private Views (Victorian)

1902

from The London Season
http://edwardianpromenade.com/?p=30

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"Visiting the Royal Academy Summer exhibition was (and is) an important social occasion.

"About noon the Queen's party arrives and Her Majesty is conducted about the rooms by the leading members of the Academy. Between one and two she departs; ans immediately after the crowd of ticket holders for the private view cluster before the closed gratings. Punctually as the last stroke of the hour strikes, the portals are flung open and a cataract of eager amateurs rush up the staircases and make their way to the inner room of honour, all in quest of the picture ... hung upon the line in the centre of the eastern wall of the apartment"

1852