<P> The 1848 revolution liberalized the Salon . The amount of refused works was greatly reduced . In 1849 medals were introduced . </P> <P> The increasingly conservative and academic juries were not receptive to the Impressionist painters, whose works were usually rejected, or poorly placed if accepted . The Salon opposed the Impressionists' shift away from traditional painting styles . In 1857 the Salon jury turned away an unusually high number of the submitted paintings . An uproar resulted, particularly from regular exhibitors who had been rejected . In order to prove that the Salons were democratic, Napoleon III instituted the Salon des Refusés, containing a selection of the works that the Salon had rejected that year . It opened on 17 May 1863, marking the birth of the avant - garde . The Impressionists held their own independent exhibitions in 1874, 1876, 1877, 1879, 1880, 1881, 1882 and 1886 . </P> <P> In 1881, the government withdrew official sponsorship from the annual Salon, and a group of artists organized the Société des Artistes Français to take responsibility for the show . </P> <P> In December 1890, the leader of the Société des Artistes Français, William - Adolphe Bouguereau, propagated the idea that Salon should be an exhibition of young, not - yet awarded, artists . Ernest Meissonier, Puvis de Chavannes, Auguste Rodin and others rejected this proposal and made a secession . They created the Société Nationale des Beaux - Arts and its own exhibition, immediately referred to in the press as the Salon du Champ de Mars or the Salon de la Société Nationale des Beaux--Arts; it was soon also widely known as the Nationale . </P>

Who controlled the contents of the annual salon exhibitions