A Brief History of the Royal Watercolour Society

The Royal Watercolour Society originated as a protest group of artists who felt themselves poorly represented by the Royal Academy. In 1804, when the RA was only about 35 years old, the painters who used watercolour became dissatisfied by the way in which their pictures were hung disadvantageously amongst the oil paintings. Also, the RA would not elect an artist who painted only in watercolour. They therefore decided to form their own society for watercolours only. They held their first exhibition in 1805, which was an immediate success with excellent sales and attendance. Another society calling itself the 'New Society of Painters in Miniature and Watercolour' was set up a couple of years later, and from this time the original group was called the 'Old' Watercolour Society (OWS). Later on they were given permission by Queen Victoria to use 'Royal' in their title, hence RWS.

Founder members included John Varley, Joshua Cristall and George Barratt. They were painters of landscape mostly in the Old Master tradition established by Claude. Within a few years, David Cox, Peter de Wint and Copley Fielding joined the OWS, and brought much vitality to the society and its exhibitions. As time went on artists such as William 'Birds Nest' Hunt, Miles Birkett Foster, JF Lewis and Samuel Palmer became members, and the society flourished. These painters represent a wide divergence of subject matter and of handling. They were related to each other artistically only by the fact that they had elected each other to membership. There was no coherent 'RWS style': this was not a school of painting in the sense of the French or Italian schools, instead it was simply a society that many of the finest painters in watercolour of the time wanted to join.