A visual journey to Soviet Central Asia

Tajik bridegroom and bride applying for a marriage certificate. Photo by Max Alpert, 1930

"Vodka, Hashish and Tobacco. Drinking destroys health. Smoking hashish destroys your body and leads a person either to prison or to a madhouse. With the money that a Red Army man spends every month on tobacco, he can buy the pictured goods and subscribe to newspaper" poster, Tashkent, Turkestan ASSR, 1920s

A pupil of a secondary school in the city of Tashkent shows the letter of the Arabic alphabet. Uzbek SSR, 1967

Elections to the Supreme Soviet of the Kirghiz SSR, February 24, 1985

"Comrades Muslims! Join the regiments of Vsevobuch military training!" Soviet poster, 1919

Lyudmila Rodina, employee of the Alma-Ata children's toys factory. Photo by Iosif Budnevich, Kazakh SSR, 1971

Border guards with Tajik girls, 1977

Schoolchildren from the Frunze Palace of Pioneers technical creativity club with their robot. Photo by Eduard Vilchinsky, Kirghiz SSR, 1965

Traditional Uzbek singer, Honoured Artist of the Uzbek SSR Shumarov Shurakhin. Photo by Semyon Fridlyand, Tashkent, 1950s

City of Kurchatov, Semipalatinsk nuclear test site. Photo by Alexander Liskin, Kazakh SSR, 1991

"For the Soviet East. 10 years of the Red Army" poster, Tashkent, 1928

Famous Soviet singer Alla Pugacheva at Baikonur cosmodrome, Kazakh SSR, 1977

Travel poster, 1934

High-mountain outdoor skating rink Medeu. Photo by Oleg Ionov, Kazakh SSR, 1990

Solar photovoltaic station in Turkmen SSR. Photo by K. Muradov, 1986

Computer Laboratory at the Department of Applied Mathematics, Lenin State University, Dushanbe, Tajik SSR, 1976

"Dekhan peasant, do not elect these people! They were your enemies and they remain your enemies" Soviet Tajik poster, 1920s

"Tea house. Uzbek SSR" Photo by: Frank and Helena Schreider, 1968

"Ballet studio students" photo by Semyon Friedland, Kazakh SSR, 1950s

Grandfather Frost and Snow Maiden on the shore of Lake Issyk-Kul. Photo by Nikolai Zhiganov, Kirghiz SSR, 1981