When Russia invaded Ukraine back in February, most people in the UK had at least heard of the country. But fewer knew much about its history and culture. Did you know, for example, that Ukraine once had a rich and vibrant camera industry? This was before the country became a sovereign state following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, so Ukrainian camera manufacture is part of the much larger story of the Russian and Soviet photographic industry. Concentrating on Ukraine, however, two names come to the fore: Kiev and Fed. The former in particular produced cameras of almost every conceivable type, from tiny spy cameras to monster medium-format SLRs.
The Kiev factory
The Arsenal Factory, a fortress-like building in Kiev, dates to 1764. It was established as a repair and production facility for the Imperial Russian Army, and continued to produce military equipment up to and throughout World War II. When the war ended in 1945, the factory turned its attention to cameras – and made a lot of them.
Following the post-war peace agreement, Germany was required to pay reparation and, among the German products that the Russians wanted were Zeiss Ikon’s Contax II and III cameras. Following the destruction of Zeiss’s records during the war, the Russians demanded that drawings for the cameras be recreated. They also acquired camera parts, the machinery to make them, information on training and installation, sample cameras and accessories, even a German workforce. With this, the
