University of Film and Television (KiT)

SPbGIKiT is the only university in Russia that conducts training of a full range of specialists for the film industry, television and mass media. Graduates of the Institute become those professionals who determine the face of contemporary Russian cinema and television.

The history of the university began at the dawn of the twentieth century: on September 9, 1918, the Higher Institute of Photography and Phototechnology was established by a decree of the Council of People's Commissars of the RSFSR in Petrograd.

The breakthrough in technology was 1920 - a technology was developed for the domestic production of photo paper and negative bromogelatin photo plates, the design of the first Soviet cameras and film projectors. In 1923, developed by A.F. Shorin amplifiers and loudspeakers were used in Moscow to broadcast on the streets and squares during the holidays, and in January 1926, A.F. Shorin invented a device for recording the sound of movies, a stationary TOMP film projector, equipped with a dynamo machine, known to all as film transfer, was developed.

In 1929, the first sound cinema in the country was opened in Leningrad, in which they demonstrated on the equipment of the inventor A.F. Shorina sound films and the first dubbed silent film "Ryazan Women".

In the seventies, in connection with the rapid development of television, the department of cinema and television technology was established, distance learning began to develop, foreign students appeared at the Institute. Actively began to unfold research work aimed at improving the technique and technology of cinematography and related industries, increased scientific cooperation LIKI with film studios - "Mosfilm", "Lenfilm", a film studio in the name of Dovzhenko, with the enterprises of LOMO, NPO Ekran, software Svema, Positive.

The works of students of SPbGIKiT regularly participate and win in Russian and international festivals. Student films were nominated for the student Oscar, prizes of the Russian Kinotavr festival, and the Berlin Film Festival. Graduates and teachers of the Institute are prize-winners of the Venice Festival, Golden Eagle awards, nominees for the Academy Award. The Institute is the winner of the Nika Award for its contribution to the development of film education.

Since 2001, the Institute annually holds the Piterkit Student Film Festival, bringing together young and talented directors, cameramen, and sound engineers.

The pride of the university is the building on Pravda Street with a mosaic icon on the facade, the former School Council under the Holy Synod with the Church of the Holy Blessed Prince Alexander Nevsky and the school. The building was erected at the end of the 19th century in memory of Emperor Alexander III at the initiative of the Chief Prosecutor of the Holy Synod, K.P. Pobedonostsev. The temple was consecrated on January 17, 1901. The style of the building is inspired by Russian architecture of the XVII century. The facade was decorated with majolica and mosaic inserts. A large window on the eastern facade was decorated with a stained-glass window, and the southern facade - a unique mosaic panel-icon “Christ blessing the children”, created according to the drawings of the academician of painting A.N. Novoskolceva.

In 1918, the temple building was occupied by the Higher Institute of Photography and Phototechnics, today - St. Petersburg State University of Cinema and Television. In 2014, the facade decor was restored, the mosaic icon was opened and consecrated in May 2015.