Photographer Elliott Erwitt with Marilyn Monroe and Montgomery Clift. Nevada, USA, 1960. © Bruce Davidson / Magnum Photos

Legendary photographer and long-time Magnum member Elliott Erwitt has passed away at the age of 95. Elliott Erwitt was born Elio Romano Ervitz to Russian-Jewish parents in Paris in 1928. He spent his childhood in Milan, and emigrated to the US in 1939 when fascism drove his family out of Italy. Erwitt was living with his father in Los Angeles when he began to take portraits of local people to make money. Working in a commercial darkroom, the teenage photographer spent time printing images of actors before further experimentations with photography at Los Angeles City College. In 1948, Erwitt moved to New York, the city that would go on to provide material for the work of much of his career, and where his life and family would be centered. After a time working as a janitor, he took up film classes at the New School for Social Research...

Magnum Photos: Remembering Elliott Erwitt (1928–2023)