The foundation of the Academy of Arts

The artistic life of St.-Petersburg always occupied the honourable place in the development of the Russian art. Many prominent masters of painting, sculpture and graphic art studied and worked in the city. Since the start of the 18 century Petersburg became the hearth of the new secular culture, that changed the religious conception of the world of the Old Russia. The public and political revival of Russia was reflected in the painting. Peter the Great attached special importance to painting. He wrote to Senate, that "Without painting and engraving the new achievements and scientifical studies results could not be preserved." The new city needed artists and sculptors to decorate the buildings and to make portraits.In 1724 the project of the Academy of Arts foundation arose, but it was not executed, when Peter the Great was alive. The main idea was to create the national artistic school. But the new city became the center of the artistic education in Russia.

In the start of the 18 century the great role in the young artists education was played by the School of painting on the basis of the Petersburg printing house and the "painters team" in the "Buildings supervising Committee", managing the construction and decoration of the tsar's palaces in Petersburg and its suburbs. During the very first decades after the city foundation there was the group of the young artists, refused to work with the stable definitive canons of the old Russian art,who turned to the real world depicting and man psychological world reflection.The first Russian portrait artists Ivan Nikitin and Andrei Matveyev were sent abroad by Peter the Great to develop their skill. Nikitin painted several portraits of Peter the Great and the number of portraits of the energetic statesmen of that time ("Getman",1724 ). In 1757 in Petersburg according the order of Yelizaveta Petrovna the Academy of "three main arts" was established. Seven years later this Academy received the status of the Emperor's from Catherine II. The Academy became the real center of the Russian artistic life and united the best artists, sculptors, architects and graphic artists. The hundreds of the young artists received serious knowledge in the fields of drawing, painting, modeling, anatomy, perspective and so on.

The management of the Academy tried to keep the young people from the influence of the progressive ideas, but these ideas were spread among the pupils and the lecturers. The reason was, that the majority of the most prominent artists of the 18 century were of people's origin. The very first graduates from the Academy and public exhibitions, organized by its staff since the 60-s of the 18 century, has shown the high level of its graduates training. In the 18 century the Academy museum was organized. It contained the masterpieces of the Russian and foreign art. The Academy considered the historical painting to be the main genre of the art. Historical canvases of A.P.Loosen, I.A.Akimov, G.I.Ugriumov appealed to the best human feelings of the Russian people despite the academic character of the pictures. One of the first Russian pictures with the national history theme is the monumental canvas of Anton Losenko "Vladimir and Rogneda" (1770).