3-007-163 - Heritage Art/Heritage Images

Sukhumi; general view of city and bay from Cherniavskii Mountain, between 1905 and 1915. Capital city of the Republic of Abkhazia, and port on the Black Sea. Russian chemist and photographer Sergey Prokudin-Gorsky (1863-1944) was a pioneer in colour photography which he used to document early 20th-century Russia and her empire, including the vanishing way of life of tribal peoples along the Silk Route in Central Asia. In a railway-carriage darkroom provided by Czar Nicholas II, Prokudin-Gorsky used the three-colour photography process to record traditional costumes and occupations, churches and mosques - many now Unesco World Heritage sites - as well as modernisation in agriculture, industry and transport.