House of Happiness - photos by Rena Effendi of women in the Ferghana Valley, part of central Asia's ancient Silk Route now known as "the heroin highway" - "a geographical and cultural mishmash where three countries and many ethnicities cluster." More about the photos. (Some photos NSFW) [more inside]
posted by madamjujujive on Dec 17, 2009 - 14 comments

Russian food porn. [more inside]
posted by TheWhiteSkull on Nov 18, 2009 - 59 comments

After the Wall: Traces of the Soviet Empire
posted by vronsky on Nov 1, 2009 - 12 comments

Soyuz rocket rolls to launch pad. A fine photoset of an otherwise routine Russian rocket rollout. I can tell that photographer Bill Ingalls loves rockets. His favs.
posted by Chinese Jet Pilot on Sep 29, 2009 - 34 comments

Real USSR is a blog containing commentaries on everyday life in the former Soviet Union. The liberal use of family and other amateur photos provides unusual insight into the daily experience of Soviet life. Topics range from 1940s homemade double-exposure photography to queueing to USSR - the birthplace of feminism. via
posted by Rumple on Aug 5, 2009 - 23 comments

"Exactly one hundred years ago a Russian photographer, began a remarkable project. With the blessing - and funding - of the Tsar, Nicholas II, he embarked on an extraordinary journey to capture the essence of Russia in full color photographs." [more inside]
posted by mudpuppie on Jun 18, 2009 - 47 comments

Anna Skladmann's Little Adults. Photographs of the children of the ultra-rich in Russia.
posted by chunking express on Apr 29, 2009 - 51 comments

Every day we go on to the streets, dying at his defenders who thought about us. About us, that they were not destined to see. But we can remember!

And imagine that the horror that the people was to survive.

WWII era Photographs, I assume, of Leningrad combined with current photographs. This era has also recently been portrayed effectively by David Benioff in his novel City of Thieves. Found the pictures via Warren Ellis who thinks the photographer may be Sergei Larenkov.
posted by zzazazz on Jan 29, 2009 - 16 comments

When Prague Spring Gave Way to Winter. [more inside]
posted by chunking express on Sep 17, 2008 - 12 comments

"Magnum photographer Thomas Dworzak is in Georgia for The Wall Street Journal. His photographic essays from the region span two decades and tell a moving story of the people and now war there." [more inside]
posted by chunking express on Aug 18, 2008 - 29 comments

Soviet Museum has some great retro photography, industrial, postcards, propaganda, "Soviet Union" magazine, aspects of moscow, red army, etc [did I mention erotic too?]. It even has 'Vladimir Putin Favourite Places' (which as far as I can tell, is one place). Set aside some time if this sort of thing interests you.
posted by tellurian on Apr 21, 2008 - 20 comments

Art Deliverance - Alex Klochkov's gallery of abandonment from the Soviet Union. There's next to no explanation of the photos, unfortunately. Indirectly via Retrospectacle's post about the brain lab.
posted by Wolfdog on Jan 27, 2008 - 13 comments

Russos takes photos of Moscow Metro construction. Also of a half-abandoned river port, a cool bridge being put together, and an old underground nuclear submarine base. But mostly of the Metro, behind the scenes. (Don't ask me how he gets access.) [more inside]
posted by parudox on Dec 6, 2007 - 4 comments

The Roma Journeys - contemporary photographs of Roma life in Hungary, India, Greece, Romania, France, Russia, and Finland by Joakim Eskildsen. For more photo essays and info on the Roma, see two superb prior posts by plep and taz.
posted by madamjujujive on Nov 15, 2007 - 26 comments

Portraits of rural Russians by the photojournalist Pavel Bezrukov. He is born in 1962, and started with photography as a hobby. Currently freelancing as a photo correspondent for the Moscow-based Orthodox magazine Foma. Some more samples of his work can be found at Orthodoxy Photo.
posted by Harald74 on Aug 7, 2007 - 22 comments

Motherland - a photo essay of Russia by Simon Roberts. (via conscientious)
posted by sgt.serenity on Jul 17, 2007 - 5 comments

Creepy High Voltage Installations The Russian countryside yields sometimes most improbable sights - abandoned artifacts and installations from bizarre military/scientific research, strangely futuristic forms left to rust and decay - to be found by a curious photographer. "Master" stumbled upon this installation close to Russian city of Istra (50 km from Moscow) quite by chance, and these mysterious shots were percolating for a while around the web, until the answer was found. According to this little, cryptic, and quite secretive website [in Russian], the weird alien-like towers are the Experimental Grounds for High-Voltage Generation, the only open-air kind in the world. Amazingly, it's still in use... as the powerful lightnings rip through the night and the darkened forest - much like in "The Prestige" movie.
posted by psmealey on Jul 4, 2007 - 38 comments

Russia in photos: 1941-1945.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken on May 11, 2007 - 32 comments

Canadian photographer Christopher Herwig provides a fascinating glimpse of the people and places of 5 of the "-stan" countries of Central Asia. You can see more work and current projects on his flickr page. Noteworthy photo essays: Arsan Baths in Almatry, Soviet Roadside Bus Stops (seen here before), and his recent The Wheelbarrow Operators of Monrovia.
posted by madamjujujive on Apr 11, 2007 - 16 comments

Radiating Places. Twenty years after the Chernobyl disaster, seven artists from Moscow, Minsk, and Berlin travelled to the desolate, restricted area to commemorate the catastrophe.
posted by Gamblor on May 22, 2006 - 17 comments

Sechtl-Vosecek. A collection of photographs taken over the last 150 years are in the process of being digitized. Check out the Sokol costume ball Šibřinky or take a trip from Bechyně to Tábor. Also available is a selection concentrating on Bukhara from the Prokudin-Gorsky Collection. And much, much, more.
posted by tellurian on Apr 17, 2006 - 7 comments

Beautiful decay pictures of Russia in decline.
posted by drezdn on Mar 8, 2006 - 27 comments

Russian photographs 1917-1945 A collection of photographs from the Howard Schickler Gallery,including the Battle of Stalingrad, the Arctic, the collectivization of agriculture, and others. I liked the photos by Olga Lander, in particular.
posted by Gamblor on Jan 29, 2006 - 17 comments

Mountain photography from Russia and around the world, including some nice panoramas. Browse the archive by date from the left column, or choose albums (such as this one) from the right column.
posted by Wolfdog on Feb 12, 2005 - 7 comments

A golden buckle on the steel girdle of Russia : Completed in 1905 and considered to be among the major masterpieces of Russian engineering, the Circum-Baikal Railway offers Trans-Siberian Rail passengers breathtaking views of the world's oldest lake and its rugged surroundings. Over only 72 kilometers, the railway's designers had to construct 200 bridges and viaducts and 33 tunnels to navigate the terrain.
posted by sellout on Jan 19, 2005 - 11 comments

Sergei Mikhailovich Prokudin-Gorskii took three b&w photos of his subjects using red, green, and blue filters. Now, they've been digitally composited, and we have stunning, authentic color photographs of Russia in the early 1900's.
posted by buriednexttoyou on Dec 27, 2004 - 49 comments

Life in Vladimir An amateur photographer would like to introduce you to Vladimir, one of the most beautiful cities of ancient Muscovy. Via Seelangs, a list serve for Slavic and East European Languages.
posted by gesamtkunstwerk on Sep 15, 2004 - 1 comment

The Most Various Russian Photographs.
posted by hama7 on May 11, 2004 - 2 comments

Some very moving Soviet war photography, notably several shots of the famously doctored (not to mention staged) but nonetheless dramatic hoisting of the Red Flag over a burned out Reichstag (a scene which, by the way, recently appeared in a videogame).
posted by rafter on Apr 12, 2004 - 7 comments

Colour photographs of Russia , pre-World War I. Very beautiful. Lots of churches, gardens, and people. via /dev/null.
posted by Jimbob on Jan 22, 2004 - 9 comments

Sheremey's Gallery. Russian artists and photographers.
posted by plep on Nov 28, 2003 - 2 comments

Russian Dacha Panormas - what a charming place! The voyeur in me likes to peek in houses to see how other people live. This is just one of many fascinating Russian interiors from Bee Flowers whose portfolio celebrates the everyday. Don't miss the magnificent Moscow Metro series.
posted by madamjujujive on Nov 28, 2003 - 7 comments

Mimosa is a retro look at Russia through engaging and often playful snapshots - it has all the feel of rummaging through a box of photos in an attic. Communist Store Windows offers another, more recent glimpse behind the iron curtain. Both galleries are like shots of peppered vodka.
posted by madamjujujive on Aug 31, 2003 - 15 comments

The Russian Avant-Garde Book is an online version of the MoMA exhibit, featuring 112 books originally published in Russia during the intensely creative period between 1910 and 1934, before Stalin outlawed any style but social realism. The site is separated into three chronological themes and includes examples of futurist works, constructivist graphic design, children's books, propaganda, photography and photomontage, revolutionary imagery, architecture and industry, war themes, folk art and judaica...
posted by taz on Oct 8, 2002 - 16 comments

Wandering Camera doesn't strike you with quality of the pictures, but with sheer volume and coverage. I've only been to SPb once, and didn't see nearly as much as what's covered in the albums. Rather than to capture the best visuals of a site, it puts you into its atmosphere.
posted by azazello on Aug 25, 2001 - 3 comments

Early (around 1910) amazing COLOR photographs from Russia by Prokudin-Gorskii, photographer for the Czar. He essentially had three cameras, each with a separate Red, Green, or Blue filter, and snapped the same shot at the same time. So all the "reds" were recorded, in B&W, on one photographic plate, and likewise down the line. Then he could use the filters to recreate the scene and project it onto a screen in color. (more inside) (props to slashdot for the link)
posted by jwells on May 7, 2001 - 58 comments