The book introduces the biographies of artists of the 18th - first half of the 19th centuries: F. Rokotova, F. Shubin, D. Levitsky, V. Borovikovsky, I. Martos, O. Kiprensky, V. Tropinin, A. Venetsianova, K. Bryullova. The work of artists is considered in the context of the socio-political and artistic life of Russia. An analysis of specific works of art allows us to get an idea of ​ ​ the origin and development in the art of this time of classicism, sentimentalism, romanticism, about the maturation of realistic trends in the work of leading masters, which paved the way for the bright flowering of painting in the following decades.