This exhibition is dedicated to the artistic career of Fyodor Nikolaevsky (1849–1917), the first and only photographer of the Imperial Hermitage.

Quite popular nowadays and often published in scholarly editions or included in exhibitions, his works are for the first time displayed to such a great extent (over 100 exhibits), shedding light on various stages of the photographer’s professional practice. A talented engraver, Fyodor Nikolaevsky also managed to produce artistic visualisation of a wide array of artworks. Brought together are reproduction photographs, pictures of exhibits lost after 1917, representations of museum rooms at the turn of the twentieth century and photographers’ personal possessions.