Russia’s St. Petersburg Union of Designers initiated and hosted an exhibition themed "Fangyan (Dialect)" to display the artwork of teachers from Shanxi University’s Academy of Fine Arts from Oct 16 to 28 to further advance both sides’ academic exchanges and cooperation.

Russian artists and the exhibiting teachers from Shanxi University’s Fine Arts Academy pose for a group photo in front of the exhibited paintings. [Photo/sxu.edu.cn]

The opening ceremony for the Shanxi University artwork exhibition was held in St. Petersburg on the afternoon of Oct 16. Delegates from St. Petersburg Union of Designers, St. Petersburg State University, and St. Petersburg Art and Industry Academy were all present at the event, marking a significant step for Shanxi University as it spreads its influence and promotes intercultural understanding and relations around the world.

Painting from Shanxi University on display in St. Petersburg. [Photo/sxu.edu.cn]

Before the exhibition opened, the delegation from Shanxi University’s Fine Arts Academy, headed by the dean Gao Xinxi and the vice dean Wang Zhijun, toured several museums, with the first being the State Hermitage Museum, one of the world’s largest and oldest museums of art and culture, on Oct 14.

The world famous State Hermitage Museum sits under a blue sky, as seen from the Palace Square. The museum ranks as one of the four greatest museums around the globe, covering an area of 1.3 million square meters and housing more than 270 million items of precious cultural relics and artwork. [Photo/saint-petersburg.com]

The group of visiting teachers was impressed by the incredible collections in the museum, which expanded their thoughts and horizons.

The next stop the team headed for was the I. Repin St. Petersburg State Academy Institute of Painting, Sculpture, and Architecture on Oct 15.

A panorama shows the spectacular view of the waterside I. Repin St. Petersburg State Academy Institute of Painting, Sculpture, and Architecture, one of the oldest and largest higher art institutions in Russia. Previously founded between 1764 and 1788 to cultivate home-grown artists by Alexander Kokorinov and Vallin de la Mothe, the Institute has produced a galaxy of talented artists, including such Russian great painters and architects as Ilya Repin. And some renowned Chinese artists and professors teaching at China’s only artistic university, the Central Academy of Fine Arts, graduated from this institute. [Photo/en.wikipedia.org]

Both sides communicated their mutual educational philosophies and valued concepts with each other, hoping to generate more talented people of integrity and expertise.

On Oct 16 they arrived at the St. Petersburg State Art-Industrial Academy which was built in 1876. Shanxi University’s representatives met with the Academy’s president, Dr. Kichedzhi Vasily, and directors of its major faculties and agencies related to the International Exchanges Agency to further their collaborated efforts to train artistic professionals.

Gao Xinxi, dean of Shanxi University’s Fine Arts Academy, shakes hands with Dr. Kichedzhi Vasily, principal of St. Petersburg State Art-Industrial Academy. [Photo/sxu.edu.cn]

The delegation was shown around the State Tretyakov Gallery next to the Moscow River, the foremost depository of Russian fine art in the world. The gallery, set up in 1856, is especially famed for its treasured oil paintings of the Peredvizhniki, often called The Wanderers or The Itinerants in English, a group of Russian realist artists who formed an artists' cooperative in protest of academic restrictions. This evolved into the Society for Travelling Art Exhibitions in 1870.

The tour came to an end with a visit to the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, the largest museum of European art in Moscow. The museum has the largest collection, about 560,000 items, generated by ancient and modern artists, including Rembrandt, Monet, Van Gogh, and Gauguin.

This activity is of much importance for Shanxi University as it provided an opportunity for the institution, and its Academy of Fine Arts, to expand its global impact on academic performance in the arts and integration of traditions and modernism, as well as a combination of excellent Chinese and Western cultures. The school’s Fine Arts Academy is targeted to achieve a fusion of the most outstanding arts between China and the western world in order to carry forward local characteristic elements.

The delegation joins some Russian students as they paint. [Photo/sxu.edu.cn]