Karl Gotthard Graß 
The Caracci Falls Near Aderno
at the Foot of Mt. Etna
1808

Johann Heinrich Baumann
Still-Life
1820

Kārlis Hūns
The Young Gypsy
1870

Jūlijs Feders
Chalk Hills
Ca. 1881

In the 18th and 19th centuries, visual art in what was then the Baltics – Kurzeme, Vidzeme and Estonia – was closely tied to art in Western Europe and Russia but was dominated by the influence of German and Russian art. This had been determined by historical and cultural links as well as the propensity for artists to migrate, a characteristic of the time.

The self-awareness of a Russian art school had its origins during the reign of Peter the Great at the beginning of the 18th century and at the same time the Baltic region was gradually being incorporated into the Russian empire. In an attempt to put some kind of order in art, the Imperial Academy of Art was founded in St. Petersburg in 1757.

Ties with Western Europe – Italy, France and especially the centres of art in Germany, were strengthened through artists’ study tours as well by those artists who had been educated abroad and were now looking for work in the Baltics.

The works on show have a twofold connection with the Baltic region – it was either where the work had been produced or it was also the artist’s native land. On the other hand, the artists may often be seen to represent other schools (German, Russian) by virtue of their professional training and place of work.

In the 19th century, as art in the Baltics became professional and surpassed the level of provincial craftsmanship, the role of academically trained artists became increasingly important. The local Baltic Germans studied or acquired academic titles and positions in the academies of St. Petersburg, Dresden, Berlin, Munich, Düsseldorf, Vienna, and elsewhere.

In the second half of the 19th century the first Latvian artists began to appear albeit not yet consciously striving for a national originality. These artists obtained their professional mastery and academic principles mainly at the St. Petersburg Academy of Art. Like many of the Baltic Germans, they also took up residence away from their homeland because of the lack of the availability of suitable education, employment and an art market. Because they had become part of the formation process of European national schools, Latvian and Estonian art only came onto the scene as two independent schools at the end of the century.

Impressions of Western European art were echoed in both Baltic and Russian art: late Baroque and Rococo in the 18th century and the influence of Classicism, Romanticism, Biedermeier, and Realism in the 19th century. There were also various unifying principles of Academism of a stylistic nature. Academism, a teaching method based on classical traditions widespread in the academies of Europe at the time, brought Baltic art closer to the stylistically related international art scene.

The collections of Baltic and Russian art on display demonstrate the parallels in stylistic, thematic and creative impulses while at the same time affirming their specifically local characteristics.