Academic Art, Academies and the Academy System

As is so often the case in Art History, we have Italy to thank for this particular innovation. Informal training academies began to spring up in Florence and Rome during the late 15th-century, followed by formal Accademias in the late mid-16th. The rest of Europe was not far behind in creating Académies, Academies and Akademies--Royale (State sponsored) or otherwise. The Western Hemisphere caught up nearly as quickly as it settled into independent countries.