The Royal Academy Exhibition of 1880 was an art exhibition held between 3 May and 2 August 1880 at Burlington House in London. It was the annual Summer Exhibition organised by the British Royal Academy of Arts. It drew around 300,000 spectators and featured submissions from prominent artists and architects of the later Victorian era.https://chronicle250.com/1880
The rivalry between the Academy and the much newer Grosvenor Gallery continued to grow. While a number of artists associated with Impressionism had already exhibited there, this year major artists in the Academic style submitted works to both exhibitions. https://chronicle250.com/1880
The history painting Napoleon on Board the Bellerophon by William Quiller Orchardson and the seascape Britannia's Realm by John Brett received acclaim and were acquired for the nation through the Chantrey Bequest. Payne p.32
Amongst the portraits on display were two self-portraits by John Everett Millais and George Frederic Watts. These has been produced to hang at the Ufizzi Gallery in Florence, a process organised by the President of the Royal Academy Frederick Leighton. https://chronicle250.com/1880 Julius Schrader displayed a portrait of the German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck. The French artist Jules Bastien-Lepage exhibited portraits of the Prince of Wales and the actress Sarah Bernhardt.https://www.rct.uk/collection/402333/king-edward-vii-when-prince-of-wales-1841-1910
Gallery
References
Bibliography Green, Richard & Sellars, Jane. William Powell Frith: The People's Painter. Bloomsbury, 2019. Payne, Christiana. Where the Sea Meets the Land: Artists on the Coast in Nineteenth-century Britain. Sanson, 2007.