Lee Miller Biography

Elizabeth "Lee" Miller, Lady Penrose, was a photographer, surreal artist, model, and photojournalist from America. A native of New York, Miller was often the subject of her father’s amateur photography. She spent some time in Paris when she was younger, pursuing a degree in art. After she returned to New York, she started attending the Art Students League of New York. In the 1920s New York, she established herself as a renowned fashion model before relocating to Paris, where she began her career as a fashion and fine art photographer. At the advent of World War II, she became a war correspondent. Reporting for the ‘Vogue’ magazine, she took photographs of events like the London Blitz, the liberation of Paris, and the concentration camps at Buchenwald and Dachau. After the war, she settled in Britain. During this period, she experienced several episodes of what has come to be known as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and became addicted to drinking. In the 1940s and 1950s, the British security service MI5 suspected her of being a Soviet spy. Throughout her life, she demonstrated little interest in promoting her photography. It is through the tireless efforts of her son, Antony Penrose, that her work is well-known today.