Petrov, Mykola O.

Petrov, Mykola O. [Петров, Микола], b 6 September 1875 in Elets, Orel gubernia, Russia, d 9 April 1940 in Kyiv. Photographer and photography scholar. After graduating from the Riga Polytechnical Institute (1900) he founded (1901) and presided over (1906–12) the Daguerre Society, one of the earliest photographic societies in the world. Petrov taught photography at the Kyiv Polytechnical Institute (1905–20), the Kyiv State Art Institute (1924–30), and the Kyiv Institute of Cinematography (1930–40), and also chaired the photography department of the Kyiv Institute of Forensic Medicine. His photographs were published in various Soviet magazines and were shown at international exhibitions. He made technical improvements in the printing process and wrote numerous works on photography.

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 3 (1993).]