History of Russia: Early 20th century postcard display in Nizhny Novgorod

January 17th – 31st 2012 the Russian Museum of Photography (Nizhny Novgorod) is running an exhibition “Nizhny Novgorod postcards published by V. I. Breev, “Sherer, Nabgolts and Co.”, devoted to 20th anniversary of the Russian Museum of Photography.

At the beginning of 20th century there were lots of postcards with views of towns, villages, monasteries, natural and architectural sights which came out in Russia. Landscape postcards, given as a memento or as an invitation to a journey, were very widespread and were issued by publishing houses both in cities and provincial towns. The Russian Museum of Photography in particular keeps a remarkable collection of such postcards.

This is the first time visitors can enjoy an exhibition which showcases only authentic postcards released by famous pre-revolutionary publishing houses: Moscow-based company “Sherer, Nabgolts and Co.” and a publishing house ran by Nizhny Novgorod entrepreneur, collector Vasily Breev.

The way Nizhny Novgorod looked like in the early 20th century, what has remained today and what has been lost – a unique old postcard may tell you a lot about the past of the town and its inhabitants. The exposition features over 100 color and black-and-white postcards from the early 20th century.