About Charles Saumarez Smith
Sir Charles Robert Saumarez Smith (born 28 May 1954) is a British cultural historian specialising in the history of art, design and architecture. He was the secretary and chief executive of the Royal Academy of Arts in London from 2007 until he stepped down in 2018. He was replaced by Axel Rüger, who took up the position in 2019. He was previously director of the National Portrait Gallery from 1994 to 2002, and director of the National Gallery from 2002 to 2007. He has published various articles and books, including The Company of Artists:The Origins of the Royal Academy of Arts in London and was a judge at the World Architecture Festival 2014 in Singapore and the Young Masters 2014 awards in London. Saumarez Smith was knighted in the 2018 Queen's Birthday Honours List. == Biography == Charles Saumarez Smith was born in an old rectory in the Wiltshire village of Redlynch, near Salisbury. The son of William Hanbury Saumarez Smith, a former Indian civil servant and the great-grandson of the 19th-century Archbishop of Sydney William Saumarez Smith. His older brother was the London bookseller John Saumarez Smith. He was educated at Marlborough College, where a Gainsborough portrait belonging to the school first awakened his interest in art.
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