Illustrations from the Royal Academy Lectures of Sir John Soane
Tschoban Foundation, Museum for Architectural Drawing, Berlin, 3 March – 17 June 2018

This new temporary loan exhibition is the third collaborative project between the Museum for Architectural Drawing, Berlin and Sir John Soane’s Museum, London. The exhibition showcases a series of remarkable drawings produced by Sir John Soane to illustrate his lectures at the Royal Academy of Arts, London between 1809 and 1820. Beautifully rendered by Soane’s pupils from his own office and spanning subjects ranging from pre-history to the latest buildings of Regency London, these coloured illustrations offer a fascinating insight into Soane’s architectural mind and his role as an educator.
The lecture drawings, which number over 1,000, were produced by Soane’s pupils in his office working up to 12 hours a day. Some drawings took as long as several weeks to complete. This time-consuming and costly exercise reflected Soane’s commitment to the education of aspiring architects. This commitment was also one of the driving forces behind Soane’s creation of his extraordinary house-museum in London, which he conceived to act as ‘academy of architecture’ for the benefit of ‘amateurs and students’ alike.
The exhibition shows 27 of Soane’s most beautiful and important lecture illustrations. It was first shown at the Sir John Soane’s Museum in 2007 and is now coming to Berlin in a revised form.