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The petitions to the Academic authorities written by students of the Academy of Arts in the autumn of 1863 represent an extraordinary act of defiance and a vivid expression of the democratic 'spirit of the sixties'. For the first time in the history of the Academy of Arts, Ivan Kramskoi and his fellow final year students endeavoured to point out flaws in the system of examinations and attempt to convince the Academic Council of the necessity to introduce a free choice of subjects in the competition for the Major Gold Medal, the highest distinction awarded by the Academy to its students. The students' determination to oppose the practice of setting one subject for all competitors was influenced by criticism of the programmes, or tasks on set subjects, by the periodical press. For instance, a sharp attack on this tradition was made by Ivan Dmitriev in his article 'Art that Bows and Scrapes', published in Iskra in September and October 1863. The students were also encouraged by the fact that in 1861 several artists received Major Gold Medals for genre paintings on contemporary subjects of their choice, such as The Village Sermon by Vasilii Perov, Prisoners' Rest by Valerii Iakobi and The Last Spring by Mikhail Klodt. The Academic Council acknowledged the need to change the practice of the examination, and the idea of giving students a theme, such as wrath, happiness, or love of the homeland, rather than a particular subject, was discussed. However, the petitions did not achieve their aim. On the contrary, the unusual courage and persistence of the students probably irritated the members of the Council, with the result that conservative attitudes took precedence. On the 9th of November, the students were invited to a meeting of the Council at which they were offered a single subject for all competitors in history painting, namely 'Valhalla, a scene from Scandinavian mythology'. In protest Kramskoi and thirteen of his fellow students left the Academy without taking the examination.
The matter of the signatories to the petitions is rather confusing. There were altogether three petitions. The first, dated 8 October 1863, was signed by fourteen students, including Kramskoi, Konstantin Makovskii, Litovchenko, Korzukhin, Lemokh, and Dmitriev-Orenburgskii. The second, addressed to the Vice-President of the Academy, Prince Grigorii Gagarin, bears twelve signatures (Litovchenko and Konstantin Makovskii are the absentees). The third petition (to Bruni) was signed by thirteen students (Litovchenko re-joined the list of signatories). Although Litovchenko and Konstantin Makovskii had failed to sign one or more of the petitions, they both joined the other signatories in seceding from the Academy. One of the other signatories to the first petition, Zabolotskii, did not secede, but his place was taken by another artist, the sculptor V.P. Kreitan, who joined the 'rebels' and left the Academy, even though he had not signed any of the petitions. In the end, therefore, fourteen students left the Academy, though not quite the same fourteen who had signed the first petition.
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