GITIS

On October 22, 1878, under the patronage of the Society of Lovers of Musical and Dramatic Art in Moscow, the Russian pianist Pyotr Adamovich Shostakovsky opened the School of Music and Drama for visitors. In 1883, the Society of Amateurs was renamed the Moscow Philharmonic Society, whose director, P. A. Shostakovsky, transferred his school to its jurisdiction. In 1886, the school, renamed the School of Music and Drama, was equated with conservatories

In 1902, the school moved to a mansion in Maly Kislovsky Lane, where the main building of GITIS is still located.

In 1918, the Music and Drama School was renamed the Music and Drama Institute, in 1919 - the State Institute of Musical Drama, and on September 17, 1922, after merging with the State Higher Theater Workshops under the direction of Vsevolod Meyerhold, it was reorganized into the State Institute of Theater Arts - GITIS; Meyerhold created a theater under him, which at first was called the GITIS Theater, in 1923 separated from the institute and turned into the Meyerhold Theater.

In 1943-1948, GITIS was headed by Stefan Mokulsky, who was dismissed in early 1949 in the course of the so-called "struggle against cosmopolitanism" - after the publication in Pravda of an article "On an anti-patriotic group of theater critics"; at the same time, many teachers were dismissed from the institute.

On the night of March 28-29, 2013, a fire broke out in the Main Building of GITIS; only the building was damaged, the students were not injured. The fire area was 500 square meters. The fire is believed to have been caused by a short circuit in the attic.