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Until 1870 the Academy enjoyed a sort of a
monopolistic position not only in controlling artistic movements in the country
but also in organizing and promoting art exhibitions. Any opposition to its
role had to be formed within the institution and to influence the minds of the
elderly academicians and win them over to something original was indeed a very
hard job to do. The idea to try not to depend any longer on the Academy for
putting exhibitions and at the same time escape its control came to the mind of
a young painter, G.G. Miasoyedov. He was one of those fourteen students who in
1863 resigned from the Academy and formed the Artel. He discussed the idea with
Kramskoy and other fellow painters from the already defuct Artel and some other
progressive artists and it was enthusiastically accepted. In November of 1870
they founded the "Association for Itinerant Art Exhibitions,"
(Tovarishechestvo Peredvizhnikh Vistavok) known in short a the Peredizhniki and
their aim was to organize annual independent exhibitions in the principal
Russian cities. This reminds us of France, one of the leading European
countries, and her group of painters who four years after their Russian
colleages formed their own "Annonymous Association of artists, painters,
sculptors, engravers, etc." Cezanne, Monet, Degas, Renoir, to name just
the most important, were among the founders, forced to establish the
association just because the official Salon continuously refused to exhibit
their works.
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