Voronezh State University
Samsonov initially decided on a career in mathematics and earned the equivalent of a Master's degree from Voronezh State University. He accepted a job with the Institute of Research but found himself more and more drawn back to art, especially after viewing some of Van Gogh's paintings at the Hermitage Museum in Leningrad (now St. Petersburg). In 1990 Samsonov moved to Leningrad, where he studied at the Ilya Repin Leningrad Institute for Painting, Sculpture and Architecture and was a student of Oleg Eremeev. He graduated from Repin in 1997, with a degree considered comparable to Doctorate of Fine Art under the Soviet system.