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Khudaibergen (Divanov), Views and people of Khiva
2022.R.22
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Title: Khudaibergen Divanov, Views and people of Khiva
Date (inclusive): 1910-1924
Number: 2022.R.22
Creator/Collector:
Divanov, Khudaibergen , 1879-1938
Physical Description:
.05 Linear Feet
(18 photographs in 1 box)
Repository:
The Getty Research Institute
Special Collections
1200 Getty Center Drive, Suite 1100
Los Angeles 90049-1688
Business Number: (310) 440-7390
Fax Number: (310) 440-7780
reference@getty.edu
URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10020/askref
(310) 440-7390
Abstract: The collection comprises 18 salted
paper photographs by pioneer Uzbek photographer and filmmaker, Khudaibergen Divanov. Fifteen
of the images are photographs Divanov made prior to the fall of the Khanate of Khiva, and
depict the city of Khiva, the capitol of the Khanate of Khiva in western Central Asia, and
its inhabitants. The remaining three photographs were taken after the fall of the Khanate of
Khiva in 1920.
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Language: Collection material is in
Russian , Uzbek .
Khudaibergen Divanov (1879-1938; Uzbek: Xudoybergan Devonov; variously: Khudaybergen
Divanov; Hudaibergen Divanov; Hudaybergan Devonov), the son of Nurmuhammad Divani, a court
secretary to the Khivan Khan Muhammad Rahim Bahadur II, was Uzbekistan's first native
photographer and filmmaker. Divanov learned photography from William Penner, a teacher at
the German Mennonite settlement at Ak Metchet. Divanov's landscape photographs and portraits
of his family caught the attention of local authorities who objected to them on religious
grounds. When their complaints reached Muhammad Rahim II, the Khan responded by asking
Divanov to take his portrait. Satisfied with the result, he gave Divanov a job at the Khivan
mint and made him the official court photographer. In 1907, Divanov accompanied the Kahn's
vizier to St. Petersburg where he was able to further his photography studies, returning to
Khiva with a Pathé motion film camera and other photography equipment. In 1910, he filmed
and produced the first Uzbek documentary film which featured Asfandiyar Khan, who had
succeeded his father as Kahn of Khiva, riding in a phaeton. Divanov's other early films
included
Architectural Monuments of Our Land (1913) and
The Sites of Turkestan (1916).
After the fall of the khanate in 1920, Divanov was installed as finance minister for the
new People's Soviet Republic of Khorezm. An imprint of his seal is found on bank notes
issued by the republic in 1922. He also continued his work as a photographer and filmmaker
and was attached to the Central Documentary Film Studio as a correspondent. His studio was
located in Tashkhovli, the summer palace of the former khan. During Stalin's Great Purge,
Divanov was denounced as an "enemy of the nation" for his membership in the Mladokhivintsi
"Young Khiva" movement during the reform period prior to the fall of the khanate. He was
executed in a Yangiyul prison camp on October 4, 1938 at the age of 60.
Following the death of Joseph Stalin in 1958, Divanov was posthumously "rehabilitated" and
a museum was established in his home in Khiva, where a cinema was also named after him.
Although most of Divanov's archive was destroyed at the time of his arrest, the museum
contains some of his documents and effects such as his first Pathé camera and a handful of
glass plate negatives.
Sources consulted:
Anahita Photo Archive. "Hudaibergen Divanov, First Central Asian Photographer."
http://www.anahitaphotoarchive.com/19th-and-early-20th-c-pre-revolutionary-photography/divanov-first-central-asian-photographer.
Fitz Gibbon, Kate. "Emirate and Empire: Photography in Central Asia 1858-1917. Posted
September 29, 2009. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1480082 or
http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1480082.
Golender, Boris. "The First Uzbek Photographer."
Sanat,
issue #4 (Januray 10, 2009). https://sanat.orexca.com/2009/2009-4/boris_golender-3.
Open for use by qualified researchers.
Contact
Library Reproductions
and Permissions
.
Khudaibergen Divanov, Views and people of Khiva, 1910-1924, The Getty Research Institute,
Los Angeles, Accession no. 2022.R.22.
http://hdl.handle.net/10020/cifa2022r22
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Acquired in 2022.
Beth Ann Guynn processed the collection and wrote the finding aid in 2022.
Scope and Content of Collection
The collection comprises 18 photographs (direct contact salted paper prints) by
Khudaibergen Divanov. Fifteen of the images are photographs Divanov made prior to the fall
of the Khanate of Khiva, and depict the city of Khiva, the capitol of the Khanate of Khiva
in western Central Asia, and its inhabitants. Views of Khiva include mosques and minarets,
the fortress, and its city gates. Portraits of kurash or belt-wrestlers, a noble man with
his hawks, and women spinning cotton threads are present in the collection as are depictions
of popular entertainments such as aerial rope-walking and ram fighting. Other scenes show
local crops and irrigation techniques. Commerce is represented by merchants transporting
their wares by canals and a large gathering of bullock carts at a trade market. The
remaining three photographs were taken after the fall of the Khanate of Khiva in 1920. One
image depicts the First All-Khorezm Kurultai Assembly of People's Representatives held on 30
April 1920, which proclaimed the end of the Khivan Khanate and the formation of the Khorezm
People's Soviet Republic (PSRK; Uzbek: Xorazm Xalq Sovet Respublikasi; Russian
transliteration: Khorezmskaya Narodnaya Sovetskaya Respublika).
The photographs were formerly in an album owned by an unidentified Soviet officer who
served in Turkestan in the 1920s. Annotations in Russian are present on the versos of 14 of
the photographs. Captions in Uzbek are present on five of the photographs, written either in
the negative or directly on the print. The titles of the individual photographs are from the
translations of the Russian annotations included in the dealer's inventory. Their unusual
Russian orthography, which hints at phonetic transcription based on Central Asian
pronunciation, suggests that the annotations were added by Divanov himself. The Uzbek
captions in the negatives were inscribed there by Divanov.
Arranged in a single series: Series I, Khudaibergen Divanov, Views and people of Khiva,
1910-1924.
Gates -- Uzbekistan -- Khiva
Mosques -- Uzbekistan --
Khiva
Uzbeks -- Portraits
Khivinskoe khanstvo -- Description and travel
Khiva (Uzbekistan) -- Description and travel
Photographs, Original.
Salted paper prints -- Uzbekistan -- 20th century
Group portraits -- Uzbekistan -- 20th century
Divanov, Khudaibergen , 1879-1938