Slavs, Brits and the question of national identity in art: Russian responses to British painting in the mid-nineteenth century

Introduction

“…By the 1860s, Paris had become the new destination of choice, though many Russian artists also visited London, as well as various cities in Germany. 1 Throughout the nineteenth century, members of the intelligentsia expressed concern over the influence this was having on Russian art and literature. In the late 1820s, Petr Chaadaev, one of the most vocal exponents of the notion that Russia lagged behind her western neighbors, declared that the nation was: "confined to a blind, superficial, [and] often awkward imitation of other nations."…”