Page:Benois - The Russian School of Painting (1916).djvu/159

 One circumstance welded a part of them together and shaped them into that nucleus which later on grew into the "Society of Wandering Exhibitions." This circumstance is known in the history of Russian art as the Secession of the Thirteen Contestants.

At that time the central figure among the academic youth was I. Kramskoy, vigorous, intelligent, incomparably more mature than all his comrades. He succeeded in grouping around himself the more gifted Academy students, and gradually the enthusiasm of this group for the new ideas, which at first was rather encouraged by the Academic administration, assumed the more conscious and concrete character of a "programme." The smouldering discontent finally broke out into an open conflict, and at the Academy Commencement of November 9, 1863, thirteen competitors for golden medals refused to take the mythological theme offered by the Academy, and, having failed to obtain freer conditions for the contest, left the Academy. Finding themselves suddenly in the gulf of life, the recent pupils of the Academy felt the necessity of uniting their forces, and they founded a sort of artists' community, which they called "Artel" (Workmen's Association).

The very fact of the secession from the Academy of a group of young and bold men was of tremendous