In the bustling streets of late-twenties Manhattan, a nineteen-year-old woman by the name of Elizabeth “Lee” Miller had a chance encounter that would change the course of her life. Pulled back from the path of an oncoming car by none other than the magnate Condé Nast, founder of the renowned publishing company, she soon found herself gracing the cover of Vogue. While some might see this as the beginning of a charmed existence, Miller’s journey over the next seventy years was far from simple, marked by harrowing experiences like witnessing the liberation of concentration camps at Buchenwald and Dachau, which she later documented as a war photographer.
Not only did Miller capture the stark reality of the concentration camps, but she also immortalized significant events such as the London Blitz and the liberation of Paris through her lens. One particularly famous photograph shows her bathing in Hitler’s tub on the very day the Führer took his own life.
At the heart of Miller’s journey were influential figures like the artist-writer Roland Penrose, businessman Aziz Eloui Bey, and the surrealist photographer Man Ray. Each of these men played a role in shaping her evolution from a fashion model to a fearless photojournalist, culminating in a career that defied expectations.
Witness the recounting of Miller’s extraordinary life by gallery owner and YouTuber James Payne in the latest episode of Great Art Explained. Additionally, watch a British Pathé newsreel featuring Miller and Penrose at home in 1946, a poignant time between the end of the war and the birth of their son Antony Penrose, who later championed his mother’s photography after her passing in 1977. Despite the belated recognition of Miller’s work, her riveting life story was only recently brought to the silver screen in the film Lee, featuring Kate Winslet’s passionate portrayal of the iconic photographer and Andy Samberg’s compelling performance as David E. Scherman.
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Discover why the U.S. documented its own World War II concentration camps and commissioned poignant photographs by Dorothea Lange.
Meet Tsuneko Sasamoto, Japan’s pioneering female photojournalist and the oldest living photographer in Japan at 107 years old.
Immerse yourself in 15-minute introductions to iconic works by artists like Warhol, Rothko, Kahlo, and Picasso through Great Art Explained.
Colin Marshall, based in Seoul, writes and broadcasts on cities, language, and culture. Follow his projects like the Substack newsletter Books on Cities and his book The Stateless City: a Walk through 21st-Century Los Angeles. Connect with him on Twitter at @colinmarshall or on Facebook.
