Martin Parr, the British photographer whose saturated colours, wry humour and unflinching eye reshaped documentary photography, has died aged 73 at his home in Bristol on 6 December 2025.
Born in Epsom, Surrey, in 1952, Parr’s interest in photography was encouraged early by his grandfather, himself a keen amateur. He studied at Manchester Polytechnic in the early 1970s, where he developed the sensibility that would define his career: a fascination with the ordinary moments that reveal who we are.
Parr came to prominence with The Last Resort (1986), his groundbreaking series on working-class holidaymakers in New Brighton. Shot in vivid, almost lurid colour, the work divided critics but proved pivotal — a bold departure from the black-and-white documentary tradition and a decisive step toward the contemporary photographic language he would help establish.
Over the next four decades, Parr built a body of work that examined the rituals, clichés and consumer habits of late-20th- and early-21st-century life. Series such as The Cost of Living, Small World and Common Sense explored social class, tourism and global consumer culture with equal parts satire, empathy and razor-sharp observation. He had an unrivalled ability to find meaning — and often absurdity — in the seemingly mundane: a supermarket trolley, a sun-burned holidaymaker, a plate of English seaside food.
In 1994 Parr was invited to join Magnum Photos, one of the world’s most influential photographic agencies, and served as its president from 2013 to 2017. His leadership, like his work, was marked by a willingness to challenge tradition and expand the boundaries of documentary practice.
In 2015 he founded the Martin Parr Foundation in Bristol, an institution dedicated to preserving his archive and supporting photographers working in the documentary tradition. The foundation stands as a testament to his commitment not only to his own work but to the future of the medium.
Parr is survived by his wife, Susie, their daughter Ellen, his sister Vivien, and his grandson.
Martin Parr’s legacy is one of clarity, colour and cultural candour. He photographed the world as it truly is — funny, awkward, staged, sincere, excessive, ordinary — and in doing so made the everyday unforgettable. His work will continue to shape how future generations see modern life, in all its strange and revealing detail.
My World of Interiors 