In this video I want to talk a little bit about Mary Ellen Mark and I'm sure you probably heard the news that she passed away in New York City this week at the age of 75.

I've never done a proper biography on Mary Ellen for the show before and I want to do one in the coming weeks but for

today I want to go ahead and talk a little bit about Mary Ellen and her work and

talk about why I think she is probably one of the most influential photojournalists

of the 20th century.

She was an amazing photographer and I will end this video with a little personal story,

but before we get into that I want to talk a little bit about Mary Allen's life.

Mary Allen Mark grew up in Philadelphia in the 1940s. She received a BFA in painting in art history

from the University of Philadelphia in 1962. It was there that she met and

became friends with Harold Feinstein who was teaching at the Annenberg School for Communication.

After graduating, she worked briefly as a drafter for a city planning office.

She quickly realized that she had no interest in drawing for a living.

She had already embraced photography, though,

and decided to enroll for the master's program at Annenberg,

and she graduated in 1964.

The following year, Mary Ellen received a Fulbright scholarship to photograph for a year in Turkey.

Early elements of her style began to emerge as she documented local people and began to embrace

an intimate style of environmental type portraits that brought her subjects into a relationship

with the viewer. Her travels included other countries and cultures as well and

began to plant the seeds for future projects. Marion's work began to show a beautiful irony, capturing

different sides of life. During an early trip to India, she photographed both

the prostitutes of Falkland Road in Bombay and the work of Mother Teresa.

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