Mary Moser Room

The Mary Moser Room was named after Mary Moser RA (1744 - 1819) as part of the 2023 RSA House updates.

One of only two female founder members of the Royal Academy, Mary Moser was highly celebrated in her lifetime and greatly admired for her paintings of flowers.

Mary was the only daughter of the Swiss artist George Michael Moser. Her precocious talents were encouraged by her father, who trained her. In 1758, at just 14, she won a prize of five guineas from the Society of Arts for a drawn ornamental design. The following year, she was then awarded our silver medal and five guineas for a painting of flowers. Our members were so impressed with this painting they had it ‘handsomely framed and glazed’ for display in the Great Room. It was then displayed at our 1760 contemporary art exhibition – the origin of the Royal Academy’s annual exhibitions, which continue to this day.

Click the images below to see two expanded examples of Moser's work.

Mary Moser: pioneering female artist

Moser was one of the two women among the Royal Academy’s thirty-six founder-members in 1768, but unlike the more inclusive Society of Arts, no further women were elected to join the Royal Academy until 1936. Her father’s inclusion as another founder-member made them the first of many parent-and-child duos to both hold the title of Royal Academician.

Moser’s best-known work, in the 1790s, involved decorating Frogmore House, Windsor, for Queen Charlotte, wife of King George III. The Queen commissioned Moser to decorate a room for which she wanted Moser to create the illusion of an “arbour open to the skies”. The 'Mary Moser Room' remains at Frogmore to this day. In addition to her other duties, Mary Moser taught the daughters of George III and Queen Charlotte to draw.

Moser continued to exhibit works at the Royal Academy under the name Mary Lloyd until 1802 when failing eyesight made her unable to keep painting.