Visualising civil society: The fireman and the photographer in late Imperial Russia, 1900-1914

This paper examines the relationship between photography and the public sphere in pre-Revolutionary Russia. In particular, it focuses on visual representations of volunteer and professional firefighters to demonstrate the critical role photography played in disseminating a conservative and authoritarian message to volunteer firefighters throughout the empire. It relates to a broader literature on civil society, although it offers a conservative interpretation insofar as it indicates how volunteers associations could do the bidding for the autocratic regime. Moreover, the analysis shows how photographers could create a visually imagined community, which spanned the great expanse of the Russian Empire.