The Academy of Fine Arts of Santa Barbara was a Valencian institution dedicated to the teaching of the arts that was inaugurated in Valencia on February 7, 1753. The creation of this academy laid the foundation stone to promote artistic studies regulated in times of the Enlightenment. Heiress of the cultural circles of the time and promoted by artists such as Ignacio and José Vergara, who had already organized a school in their workshop, Cristóbal Valero or Luis Domingo, the entity sought to overcome the trade union character, dragged from the Middle Ages, by a more intellectual training.

This academy took as a model the one of San Fernando of Madrid and also was born closely linked to the monarchy. It was called Santa Barbara in honor of Fernando VI's wife, Barbara de Braganza.

In his creation he had the support of the Valencian institutions. Thus, the city hall ceded the building of the University of Valencia in the street La Nau and the Archbishop, one of the main clients of the artists who passed through their classrooms, applauded the initiative. Nevertheless, it was extinguished in only seven years to be overshadowed, to a great extent, by the institution of Madrid and by the death of the queen, its main valedora.

Considered the germ of the current Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Carlos that with a replica of the founding statutes of the Academy of San Fernando, began its journey in 1765.

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