Martin Parr (born 23 May 1952 in Epsom, Surrey) is a British documentary photographer, photojournalist and collector. He is known for his photographic projects that take a critical look at modern society, specifically consumerism, foreign travel and tourism, motoring, family and relationships, and food.
Parr wanted to become a photographer from the age of 14 and cites his grandfather, an amateur photographer, as an early influence. From 1970 to 1973 he studied photography at the Manchester Polytechnic (now Manchester Metropolitan University). In 2008 he was made an Honorary Doctor of Artsat Manchester Metropolitan University in recognition for his ongoing contribution to photography and to Manchester Metropolitan University’s School of Art. He married Susan Mitchell in 1980 and is father of a daughter named Ellen Parr (born 1986).
Photographer
Parr began work as a professional photographer and has subsequently taught photography intermittently from the mid-1970s. He was first recognised for his black and white photography in the north of England, Bad Weather (1982) and A Fair Day (1984), but switched to colour photography in 1984. The resulting work, Last Resort: Photographs of New Brighton, was published in 1986. Since 1994 Parr has been a member of Magnum Photos. . Recent work has included a collaboration with designer Paul Smith in Ilford, capturing people wearing Smith's Autumn/Winter 2007 collection
Collector
Besides being a photographer, Parr is a keen collector of postcards, photographs and various other items, and many of his collections have been used as the basis for publications. Since the 1970s, Parr has collected and publicised the garish postcards made between the 1950s and 1970s by John Hinde and his team of photographers. The images made by Hinde and his team are a key influence on Parr's colour photography.
As an admirer of this medium he has published several photobooks as well as a work about photobooks. The Photobook: A History (in two volumes) covers more than 1,000 examples of photobooks from the 19th century through to the present day. The work was a collaboration with the critic Gerry Badger which took eight years to complete.
Documentary filmmaker
Parr's first contact with the medium of film was his collaboration with Nick Barker from 1990-1992, taking pictures to accompany Barker's film Signs of the Times. In 1997, Parr began producing his own television documentaries with Mosaic Film.
He was cameraman on the film, It's Nice Up North with comedian Graham Fellows as his character John Shuttleworth. The film is a comic documentary filmed over several years in Shetland and was released in 2006.
Parr's approach to documentary photography is intimate, anthropological and satirical. Macro lenses, ring flash, high-saturation colour film, and since it became an easier format to work in, digital photography, all allow him to put his subjects "under the microscope" in their own environment, giving them space to expose their lives and values in ways that often involve inadvertent humour.. For example, to create his book Signs of the Times: A Portrait of the Nation's Tastes. (1992), Parr entered ordinary people's homes and took pictures of the mundane aspects of his hosts' lives, combining the images with quotes from his subjects to bring viewers uncomfortably close to them. The result of Parr's technique has been said to leave viewers with ambiguous emotional reactions, unsure whether to laugh or cry.
Parr has had almost 50 books published, and featured in around 80 exhibitions worldwide - including an exhibition in London at the Barbican Arts Centre.
He is the subject of a song by French song-writer Vincent Delerm (Quinze Chansons, 2008).
