A Leeds Met fine art alumnus has had one of his paintings accepted in the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition open submission.

'ITC007', a painting of a chair by Richard Baker, will hang alongside works by Julian Opie, Frank Stella, Tracey Emin, Ed Ruscha and Paula Rego in the exhibition in London.

The Summer Exhibition is the world's largest open-submission contemporary art exhibition and attracts thousands of established and unknown artists. Now in its 241st year, the exhibition continues the tradition of displaying a wide range of new work, throwing aside normal conventions with the open submissions to pack in as many works onto a wall as possible, immersing paintings with prints, photography, film, sculpture and architecture.

Richard graduated from Leeds Met in 2003 and has been painting and exhibiting ever since. Whilst at university he was the inaugural recipient of the Gascgoine Prize and he now works at Leeds College of Art & Design. 'ITC007' is one of a series of paintings which has evolved after a furniture-making course sparked Richard's interest in modernist design, in particular tired and neglected Eames and Panton chairs. Unable to own them, Richard acquires them through his paint brush.

Richard says, "I visited the Royal Academy last year for another exhibition and was handed a free ticket to see the Summer Exhibition. After years of entering smaller open competitions I realised there was no reason why I couldn't do this one and so I've spent the last year creating a body of work with that in mind. I submitted two paintings, my favourite and ITC007, which my peers had singled out as their favourite at previous exhibitions, ITC007 was the one selected, which goes to prove you can sometimes get too close to, and stop being objective about, your own work. The exhibition is going to give me brilliant exposure and it's great that my first exhibition in London is the most important exhibition in London."

The Summer Exhibition runs from 8 June to 16 August 2009 and will also be featured on the BBC in a 'Culture Show' special. Richard's work will also appear in the 'On Your Wall' exhibition at Leeds Met Gallery on 4 and 5 July.