Martin Parr 1952-2025

Martin Parr was a British documentary photographer with a long relationship with and affection for Wales.

Parr studied photography at Manchester Polytechnic in the early 1970’s alongside peers such as Daniel Meadows and Brian Griffin - both of whom he remains friends with to this day. He became a full member of Magnum Photos in 1988 on achieving the necessary two-thirds vote of other members but not before Welshman Philip Jones Griffiths had pleaded for them to exclude him, stating…
”…His membership would not be a proclamation of diversity but the rejection of those values that have given Magnum the status it has in the world today... Let me state that I have great respect for him as the dedicated enemy of everything I believe in and, I trust, what Magnum still believes in.”

Martin Parr’s Magnum colleagues went on to select him as President of Magnum Photos International in 2014 (a post he held until 2017) and he remained a respected and active voice within Magnum Photos until his death at home in Bristol on 6th December 2025.

Above: Martin Parr giving a guided talk of his work in National Museum Cardiff in November 2019. Images: Brian Carroll

Parr is now one of the world’s most famous names in photography - both in terms of his ongoing raw documentation of society in saturated colour and also his life-long passion for collecting Photobooks and other ephemera. In 2017 he and his dedicated team opened The Martin Parr Foundation in Bristol to archive and exhibit not just his own work but also a rich and important collection of post-war British Documentary photography and archive material by other photographers. The Foundation also houses a world-class collection of Photobooks which is expanding weekly and includes a growing (albeit slowly) collection from Wales.

Recorded at the National Museum in Cardiff. Our thanks to Bronwen Colquhoun, Senior Curator of Photography, National Museum Wales.

See below for a small selection of Martin's work from Wales, Scotland and Ireland, reproduced here on Ffoton with kind permission of the photographer.

Yma ar Ffoton trwy garedigrwydd y ffotograffydd fe welwch gasgliad bychan o'i waith isod.

See more of Martin’s work on the Magnum Photos website www.magnumphotos.com/photographer/martin-parr
Find out more about events and exhibitions at The Martin Parr Foundation (and membership) at www.martinparrfoundation.org
Follow them on Twitter @martinparrfdn

Gallery images © Martin Parr / Magnum Photos and used with permission.
Banner images © Brian Carroll

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