The constantly growing ROSPHOTO collection (over 40,000 storage units) contains unique materials that reflect the history of the development of technologies, materials, styles and genres of photography.

When purchasing or accepting as gifts original photographs, glass and film negatives, albums, various printed materials or photo-cameras, the ROSPHOTO museum is guided by the principles common to the collections of the Museum Fund of the Russian Federation. We take into account the historical and documentary significance of the selected works, but give priority to their artistic value.

This approach made it possible to enrich the ROSPHOTO collection with photographs created by such remarkable masters as Georgy Raev, who was awarded a silver medal at the Paris Exhibition of 1900, and the outstanding master of photo reportage Boris Kudoyarov, who captured the heroic history of the siege of Leningrad.

A significant part of the ROSPHOTO fund consists of complete archives and collections of photographs, which are of great importance for researchers and art historians.

Such, in particular, is the collection of Russian historical and regional studies photography from the end of the 19th – beginning of the 20th century, the collection of portrait photography from the same era, which includes works by S. L. Levitsky and M. S. Nappelbaum, and an album of photographs from the expedition of O. Yu. Schmidt on the icebreaker Georgiy Sedov (1929–1930).

As a museum organization that considers its important goal to be the preservation of photographic heritage, the ROSPHOTO museum treats artistic objects created with the help of ancient and little-studied technologies with special interest and attention.

The ROSPHOTO collection includes remarkable materials related to the history of world photography, such as a collection of photolithographs from the Swiss publishing house Photochrom Zürich, a series of photographs of Italian cities taken in the 1870s–1900s, or a collection of ferrotypes by American masters from the 1880s–1900s.

Contemporary photography is represented in the ROSPHOTO collection by works by foreign and national masters.

Our collection also includes daguerreotypes, stereo photographs, and works made using early photographic techniques.

Oleg Poleshchuk's collection is a peculiar encyclopedia of Leningrad photography of the 70s and 80s of the last century, famous for such names as Boris Smelov, Oleg Bakharev, Sergey Falin. Works from this collection were presented at Sergey Falin's retrospective exhibition "Photography of the 1970s-1990s".

We are grateful to all donors for their participation in the formation of the ROSPHOTO collection. If you intend to offer ROSPHOTO a photograph or a collection of works as a gift or for purchase, please contact ROSPHOTO Chief Curator Igor Valerievich Lebedev.

Contacts: tel. +7 812 500-70-00, office@rosphoto.org

ARTICLES

A. V. Maksimova. Russian photography of the second half of the 19th – first half of the 20th century in the collection of the State Museum and Exhibition Center ROSPHOTO

L. I. Starilova. A brief overview of photographic collections in the State Museum and Exhibition Center ROSPHOTO

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Last updated on 5.09.2025