Oleg Klimov
Member of the NCU since 2026
Based in the Baltic Sea, Russia
Biography
Oleg Klimov was born in 1964 in the village of Bely Yar in the Tomsk Oblast, USSR.
After finishing school in Tomsk, an old university town in the very heart of Siberia, and completing his military service, he moved to Kazan to study for a degree in astrophysics at Kazan University.
From 1988 — photojournalist for the newspaper ‘Vechernyaya Kazan’.
From 1991, he became the permanent photojournalist in Russia for the Dutch newspaper NRC Handelsblad.
In 1993, he undertook a practical training course and worked as a photojournalist in the Netherlands. As a freelancer, he photographed for magazines including: Ogoniok, Itogi, Time, Elsevier, Stern, Le Monde, Magazine-M; newspapers: Izvestia, Komsomolskaya Pravda, Het Parool, The Times, The Independent, The Guardian, The Washington Post; news agencies France Presse and Sygma; the photo agency Panos Pictures; and others.
Since 1995, he has been the driving force behind the creation of one of the first private photo agencies in Russia, Foto*Loods. He played an active role in the establishment of, and worked at, the Russian agencies Pressphotos-Epsilon (2004) and Agency.Photographer (2006–2007).
Since 2006, he has been a participant in educational seminars on photojournalism, supported by the Ford Foundation.
From 1989 right through to 2001, he primarily documented the war in various regions and the social consequences of the collapse of the USSR in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Abkhazia, Ossetia, Chechnya, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, as well as in the Warsaw Pact countries, Eastern Europe (Bosnia, Serbia, Kosovo) and Central Asia (Afghanistan, Iraq) to cover military and inter-ethnic conflicts.
From 2008 to 2012, he was head of the ‘Documentary Photography’ workshop at the Rodchenko Moscow School of Photography and Multimedia.Since January 2010, he has been leading the multimedia project Documentary Photography Network of Liberty.SU.
In 2009, he created an original series of documentary films about Russian photographers entitled ‘Life Will Be Photography’.In 2013–2014, he initiated and took part in the Liberty.SU yachting photo expedition “From the White Sea to the Black Sea”.
Klimov’s original photographs are held in museums in Amsterdam and Washington, as well as in private collections in Russia, the Netherlands, France, the UK and the USA.Since 2026 — member of the Noga Creative Union.
Awards & Honors
2016 — the ‘Profession: Journalist’ award from the Open Russia Foundation in the ‘Photo Reportage’ category for the article ‘A Ghost Town in the Kuril Islands. Life in a military town on Iturup Island”.
1990 — All-Union ‘King of Reporting’ Prize.
Solo exhibitions
2026 — Paper Souvenir / Islands of the Subconscious, ‘Krista’ Gallery, Rybinsk, Russia.
2020 — The Shore, F11 Gallery, Saint Petersburg, Russia.
2013 — Along the Shores of Russia, Huis Marseille Museum of Photography, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
2011 — Witnesses of the Time, Metenkov House Museum of Photography, Yekaterinburg, Russia.
2010 — River-Sea, A. Sakharov Museum, Moscow, Russia.
2010 — River-Sea, White Cube Gallery, Omsk, Russia.
2007 — Black-and-White Russia, Amnesty International Exhibition Space, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
2006 — Life on the Volga, RA Gallery, Kyiv, Ukraine.
2005 — Heritage of an Empire, Dutch Museum of Photography, Rotterdam, the Netherlands.
2004 — Heritage of an Empire, European Exhibition Halls and Cultural Centres, Brussels, Belgium.
2003 — To Russia with Love, Amnesty International Exhibition Halls, Amsterdam — London, the Netherlands — the United Kingdom.
2002 — Heritage of an Empire, Nizhny Novgorod State Art Museum, Nizhny Novgorod, Russia.
2000 — Just War, Exhibition Centre of the Open Society Institute, Moscow, Russia.
1996 — Solo exhibition of documentary photography, City Exhibition Venues, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
1990 — The Last Day of Andrei Sakharov’s Life, Exhibition Hall of the National Press Club, Washington, USA.
1990 — Karabakh — The Unknown War, The Washington Post Gallery, Washington, USA.
Group exhibitions
2025 — The Outcasts: Life in Russia’s Closed Institutions, Fotodom Art Space / M.N.Y. Lermontov Library, Saint Petersburg, Russia.
2014 — From the White Sea to the Black Sea, Liberty.SU Foundation Exhibition Spaces, Moscow — Saint Petersburg, Russia.
2012 — Invisible Country, Tomsk Regional Art Museum, Tomsk, Russia.
2011 — Invisible Country, White Cube Gallery, Omsk, Russia.
2007 — Black and White / Russian Documentary Photography, Cultural Space and Gallery of Curatorial Projects, Berlin, Germany.
2001 — 'PROzrenie' International Photography Biennale, Nizhny Novgorod State Art Museum / Russian Museum of Photography, Nizhny Novgorod, Russia.
1999 — Between Belgrade and Skopje, Exhibition Galleries and Media Centres, New York, USA.
1994 — Caucasian snipers, International Photography Festival in Naarden, Naarden, Netherlands.
Bibliography
2025 — The Outcasts: Life in Russia’s Closed Institutions, Liberty.SU Publishing House, rus., ISBN 978-5-6047801-4-5, Moscow, Russia.
2022 — Calamity Islands. Sakhalin and the Kurils — terra incognita of a brutal Russian Empire, Liberty.SU Publishing House, KOPA Printing House, eng., ISBN 978-5-6047801-0-7, Kaunas, Lithuania.
2005 — Das Erbe eines Imperiums, Mets & Schilt Publishers, ger., ISBN-13: 978-9053304211, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
2004 — Erfenis van een wereldrijk: ondergang van de Sovjet-Unie, opkomst van Rusland (Heritage of an Empire / My Doomed Country), Mets & Schilt Uitgevers, dut., ISBN-10: 9053304215, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
Museum collections
Huis Marseille, Museum of Photography, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
Nederlands Fotomuseum, Rotterdam, Netherlands.
Amnesty International Exhibition and Archive Collection, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
National Press Club, Washington, USA.
The Washington Post Collection, Washington, USA.
Zimmerli Art Museum, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey, USA.
Moscow House of Photography / Multimedia Art Museum (MAMM), Moscow, Russia.
Museum of Russian Photography (MRF), Kolomna / Moscow, Russia.
ROSPHOTO State Museum and Exhibition Centre, Saint Petersburg, Russia.
Russian National Library (RNB), Department of Prints and Photographs, Saint Petersburg, Russia.
Russian Museum of Photography / Nizhny Novgorod Museum of Photography, Nizhny Novgorod, Russia.
Andrei Sakharov Museum and Community Centre (Sakharov Centre), Moscow, Russia.
Metenkov House Photography Museum, Yekaterinburg, Russia.
National Museum of the Chuvash Republic, Cheboksary, Russia.
