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Soviet Scientific Institutes
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These photographs of once top-secret institutes reveal both fantastical and futuristic technology, alongside crumbling and decrepit facilities, forming a unique document of the condition and situation of scientific research in the post-Soviet landscape.
These photographs of once top-secret institutes reveal both fantastical and futuristic technology, alongside crumbling and decrepit facilities, forming a unique document of the condition and situation of scientific research in the post-Soviet landscape.
In Soviet Scientific Institutes photographer Eric Lusito takes us on a journey through time, space and science. Gigantic control panels, monumental telescopes, inexplicable machinery - the facilities he documents might be found in comic book and graphic novel fantasies or the science fiction of Jules Verne and H.G. Wells. But why were these institutes built and what purposes do they serve today?
The Soviets promoted science as a utopian ideal to replace religion and rapidly modernise the country. 'Big science' projects, primarily for Cold War military purposes, involved thousands of researchers working in complete secrecy.
In the 1990s, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, many institutes were left destitute, their sophisticated technology condemned to extinction. But some scientists persevered, adapting to the new landscape. Today, defying the odds, they persist - even in wartime - to continue their work.
Lusito gained unique access to sites across former republics and satellites of the USSR - from a cosmic ray research centre in the remote Armenian mountains, to one of the world's largest radars located in Ukraine, which locals believed to be a climate-altering weapon.
The first visual account of this once closed world, this awe-inspiring publication bears witness to our never-ending quest for knowledge.
In Soviet Scientific Institutes photographer Eric Lusito takes us on a journey through time, space and science. Gigantic control panels, monumental telescopes, inexplicable machinery - the facilities he documents might be found in comic book and graphic novel fantasies or the science fiction of Jules Verne and H.G. Wells. But why were these institutes built and what purposes do they serve today?
The Soviets promoted science as a utopian ideal to replace religion and rapidly modernise the country. 'Big science' projects, primarily for Cold War military purposes, involved thousands of researchers working in complete secrecy.
In the 1990s, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, many institutes were left destitute, their sophisticated technology condemned to extinction. But some scientists persevered, adapting to the new landscape. Today, defying the odds, they persist - even in wartime - to continue their work.
Lusito gained unique access to sites across former republics and satellites of the USSR - from a cosmic ray research centre in the remote Armenian mountains, to one of the world's largest radars located in Ukraine, which locals believed to be a climate-altering weapon.
The first visual account of this once closed world, this awe-inspiring publication bears witness to our never-ending quest for knowledge.
Extent: 208 pp
Format: Hardback
Publication date: 2026-08-30
Size: 16.0 x 20.0 cm
ISBN: 9781068294600
Praise for Soviet Scientific Institutes
Former Soviet scientific megastructures captured in striking photos.
— New Scientist
Reaching for the stars: enduring symbols of Soviet science - in pictures. The photographer Eric Lusito takes us on a scientific journey through space and time.
— The Guardian
Lusito's camera takes us on a fascinating tour. There's an obvious retro-tinged delight in these images, along with poignant schadenfreude at the combination of misplaced optimism and downright mystery.
— Wallpaper*
Lusito documents these strange, often inaccessible spaces with a restrained eye for their scale, theatricality and lingering sense of purpose.
— Flux Magazine
About the Author
Eric Lusito is a French photographer who has been travelling in the former Soviet bloc since the 2000s. In 2021, while in Kharkiv, Ukraine, he met in a scientist who agreed to show him his laboratory. The facility reminded him of the comic books of his childhood, inspiring him to embark on a new project, exploring the under-documented world of science.
Paul Josephson, professor emeritus in history, Colby College, has studied big science and technology across the globe for over four decades. In former Soviet spaces he has stepped into research institutes from the Kola Peninsula and the Arctic Circle to the Ural Mountains and Siberia, and in the socialist world from Ukraine to Bulgaria, Hungary, the Czech Republic and the Baltic states. Paul is the author of sixteen books on global science in the twentieth century.
Damon Murray and Stephen Sorrell have been publishing critically acclaimed books on Soviet culture since 2004 with their Russian Criminal Tattoo Encyclopaedia. More recent titles include Ukrainian Modernism, Spomenik Monument Database and Soviet Bus Stops.
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