RCA: The Perfect Place to Grow

In 2012 the Royal College of Art (RCA) celebrates its 175th birthday. The oldest continuous art and design school in existence, the RCA shows no sign of aging: each year it attracts an ever-greater number of artists, designers and architects who, if their predecessors are anything to go by, will leave an indelible mark on the creative landscape of Britain and elsewhere.

The College is celebrating its birthday with The Perfect Place to Grow, an exhibition of over 350 works produced by some 180 staff and alumni. Curated by current rector Paul Thompson and Robert Upstone, former Tate curator and Director of the Fine Art Society, it boasts an impressive and diverse line up, from Edwin Lutyens and Henry Moore to Konstantin Grcic and Tracey Emin, whose 2001 installation The Perfect Place to Grow inspired its name. While Emin's title hints at the exhibition's promotional remit, it opens with a promise not to shy away from those times when the College has been "anything but perfect", echoing Emin's own infamous verdict that the best thing about the RCA was receiving her acceptance letter.

The Perfect Place to Grow is spread over three gallery spaces in the RCA' s South Kensington campus. The exhibition is itself showcase for the College's creativity; it was designed by Casson Mann (Dinah Casson is a former head of architecture) while Research Studio, founded by Dean of Communications Neville Brody, was responsible for the graphic design. This includes a striking timeline in the first room that uses paintings, photographs, letters and other ephemera to chart the history of the RCA, from its birth in 1837 as the Government School of Design to its recent expansion into South London's Battersea area.

The remainder of the exhibition is divided into four roughly chronological themes: Art for Industry; Public Purpose; Personal Expression and Political Expression. The curators identified these as the primary preoccupations of British art and design education, and this certainly rings true of the first section. Named after the art critic Herbert Read's 1934 Art and Industry, it positions itself as part of the perennial debate of the value of art; should it serve commerce or should we champion "arts for arts sake"? Those included here are in firmly in the former camp, and include everything from an 1850 teapot by V&A founder Sir Henry Cole to a Dyson vacuum cleaner, a Porsche 911 and Christopher Bailey's most recent collection for Burberry.

At times the divisions between the sections is not always clear. This was in part due to the layout of the spaces, but also with a taxonomy that occasionally felt contrived. Public Purpose for example attempted to bring two very different types of design activity under one umbrella; design for public spaces and design for the public sector. Central to this was design's increasing engagement with its social responsibility in the twentieth century, and the College is right to be proud its work in this area through the Helen Hamlyn Centre, established in 1999 and today a world leader in inclusive and socially orientated design research.

The third section opened with Emin's The Perfect Place to Grow installation, an elevated shed-like structure surrounded by foliage that pays homage to her father, an inept carpenter but skilled gardener. Given the section's theme of Personal Expression it is unsurprisingly dominated by sculptures and works on canvas, although there is a smattering of pottery and fashion. I was surprised by some of the designs exhibited here, including Anthony Dunne's and Fiona Raby's critical design practice, shown near to works by Jasper Morrison and Ron Arad. These were situated close to the entrance to the exhibition's final section, Political Expression. This was a similarly diverse collection, embracing everything from sexual politics to those of race, religion, the body and post-colonial critique, as seen in Simone Brewster's 2010 compelling The Negress chaise longue and Mammy side table. Packed with works from the likes of Jonathan Barnbrook, David Hockney and Gavin Turk this was the smallest section in the show, and yet arguably the most relevant, given the multitude of crises we find ourselves in today.

Given its currency, the small size of Political Expression was revealing, as it highlighted how the show's understandably commemoratory ethos impaired its ability to be both critical and forward-looking; there was no work by current students nor enough of an attempt to address the multiple challenges facing British art education today, including the rising fees that prohibit so many from studying at the RCA. Yet despite these issues (and admittedly speaking as an alumna), for the opportunity to see works by so many prestigious practitioners from such different fields together in one place, and to get a glimpse into British art and design education history, the The Perfect Place to Grow is an exhibition worth seeing. Catharine Rossi (@cat_rossi)

Through 3 January 2012
The Perfect Place to Grow: 175 of the Royal College of Art
Royal College of Art, South Kensington campus
Kensington Gore, London