The article notes that the problem of imagination has appeared on the periphery of research in modern psychology, focused on positivist methodology and cognitive models of the psyche. Cultural-historical psychology emphasizes the role of imagination in the formation of higher forms of behavior. The paper analyzes the process of formation of imagination in ontogenesis, and also considers the role of imagination in the life of a person. The process of imagination acquires characteristic features depending on the extent to which the personality takes possession of it: whether the imagination obeys the tasks that the person sets for himself, or vice versa, the imagination leads the personality and remains involuntary. The transition from passive to active arbitrary forms is the essence of the cultural development of imagination.