Alla Vereshchagina

THE 250th ANNIVERSARY OF THE RUSSIAN ACADEMY OF ARTS

Alla Vereshchagina
The Academy of Arts and the “Wanderers”

№1 2007 (14)

Before the emergence of the Wanderer artists, or Peredvizhniki, all aspects of Russian art – the education and work of professional artists, their rank, title, rights and position in society – were directly connected with the Academy of Arts. When, in the 1860s, a group of former Academy students established the St. Petersburg Artel of Artists, a distinct, independent union, their work nevertheless continued to be exhibited in the Academy, and the majority of the group eventually became academicians: the world of Russian art was, in those days, organised around a single pole.