On 21 September he received orders to leave the country within 3–4 weeks. Pilo felt that he was set up in court intrigues by Ove Høegh-Guldberg, a central figure in the court ruling Denmark at the time, Peder Als and Secretary of the Cabinet Andreas Schumacher. Als had been one of Pilo’s best students, and had traveled to Rome and Paris, bringing back a strongly Italian-inspired painting style that became the rage. Als' criticism of the foreign element within the Academy helped lead not only to the downfall of Pilo himself, but to the disappearance of the many French artists at the Academy in the years after 1770.