200th Anniversary Timeline

The Founding Years and the Rise of an American School

We are proud to present this historical timeline highlighting key moments from the founding of the institution in 1825 through today, revealing the role it has played in the artistic and cultural life of this country over two centuries. Please check back for subsequent chapters.

Frustrated by the conservatism and lack of artist engagement at the American Academy, painter and inventor Samuel F.B. Morse calls a meeting of the artists of New York at the Old Alms House in City Hall Park. It is considered the first meeting of artists ever held in the city.

The 30 artists and architects gathered at this meeting create an organization they called the New York Drawing Association.

"That its members should meet in the evenings 3 times per week, for drawing....Each member furnish his own drawing materials. The expense of light, fuel, etc. be paid by equal contributions. New members should be admitted on a majority vote–paying $5 entrance fee.

After an attempt by the American Academy to usurp control of the Drawing Association, the artists met again and voted to create their own academy. “We are therefore left to organize ourselves,” Morse declared.

The group ratified the establishment of the National Academy of the Arts of Design that would include four categories of membership in the arts of "design": painting, sculpture, engraving, architecture.

Thus was founded the first art organization in America whose membership was composed exclusively of professional artists and architects.

National Academy moves to Arcade Baths, 39 Chambers Street. Exhibitions are held here on the second floor until 1830.

1829: Second constitution was printed and membership was divided into three classes:  Associate National Academicians (ANA), National Academicians (NAs), and Honorary Members.

Elected Associates could be elevated to Academicians. Active members had to be residents of NYC and vicinity. Honorary Members were either nonresident professional artists or arts patrons and distinguished members of other professions (Honorary Membership was eliminated in 1863)

It was a top priority of the young Academy. The goal from its inception was to provide the public with a display of the yearly progress of the state of the art of the United States.

It was the most significant and influential of the serial exhibitions held in this country, helping to illustrate and define new directions in American art.

The Annual was the premier venue for U.S. artists to show off their accomplishments, and the launching point of many careers. In 1843, the Academy’s Annual was referred to by the New York Daily Tribune as “a central point of attraction for the fair and fashionable of the city."

A couple of decades after the Academy's founding, the Tenth Street Studio Building–the first purpose-built building for artist studios in the U.S.–opens at 51 West 10th Street. It served as the living and working quarters for many National Academicians.

Designed by Richard Morris Hunt, the Tenth Street Studio Building counted among its occupants Academicians including Albert Bierstadt, William Merritt Chase, Frederic Church, Frederick Dielman, Winslow Homer, and Walter Shirlaw, among many others.