This is a plaster cast of a famous classical statue known as the 'Apollo Belvedere'. The Royal Academy owned numerous such casts, from which students made drawings in order to improve their knowledge of the idealised proportions of the male figure; here the 'Seven Wise Men' are painting from the statue, despite the fact that it has lost its head.

The monkey beneath the statue wears a 'bonnet rouge', or red cap, which was used by British satirists to denote a supporter of the French Revolution and decry them as a blood-thirsty monster. The monkey is urinating on portfolios inscribed with the names of Paul Sandby, Richard Cosway, Francesco Bartolozzi, Michelangelo Rooker, J.M.W. Turner, Philippe-Jacques de Loutherbourg, William Beechey and Henri Fuseli. These were the small band of Academicians sensible enough not to be taken in by Miss Provis's claims.