Lee Miller, born Elizabeth Miller on April 23, 1907, in Poughkeepsie, New York, led a life marked by remarkable transformations. Her journey saw her evolve from an iconic fashion model to a celebrated surrealist muse, and later into one of the most daring and groundbreaking photojournalists of the 20th century. Through a combination of determination, talent, and a refusal to be confined by societal expectations, Miller carved a path through some of the most significant cultural and historical events of the century. Her life was as complex and unpredictable as the world she captured through her lens.
Miller was the second child of Theodore and Florence Miller, born into a family that fostered creativity and intellectual curiosity. Her father, an amateur photographer, introduced her to the camera at a young age, instilling a passion for photography that would later shape her career. But Miller’s childhood was also marked by trauma. At the age of seven, she was sexually assaulted, an experience that undoubtedly had a lasting impact on her life and her art, influencing her often raw, unflinching approach to both photography and self-representation.
At the age of 19, Lee Miller moved to Paris to study art. She was initially focused on painting, but her striking beauty soon brought her into the orbit of the fashion world. By 1927, she had returned to New York, where she was discovered by Condé Nast, the publisher of Vogue magazine, in what can only be described as a chance encounter. After almost being hit by a car, Miller was saved by Nast, who, recognising her beauty, promptly placed her on the cover of Vogue. Thus, her career as a fashion model began, and within a short time, she became one of the most sought-after models of the 1920s, her face a staple of fashion photography.
However, Miller was not content with merely being in front of the camera. She harboured a deep desire to create and contribute to the world of photography from behind the lens. In 1929, she returned to Paris, where she became involved with the Surrealist movement, a group of avant-garde artists that included the likes of Man Ray, Salvador Dalí, and Pablo Picasso. It was during this period that Miller truly began to flourish as a photographer, learning under the tutelage of Man Ray, with whom she developed both a professional and romantic relationship. Miller soon became one of Ray’s closest collaborators, often helping him in his work while simultaneously developing her own distinct style.
One of her most notable contributions to photography during this time was the co-discovery of the solarisation technique, a method that creates a ghostly, otherworldly effect by exposing a negative to light during the development process. Though the exact circumstances of its discovery are debated, it is generally accepted that Miller played a key role in its development, cementing her place in the history of Surrealist photography. Her time in Paris also saw her take on the role of muse, posing for artists such as Picasso and other key figures in the movement. However, Miller’s artistic talent meant that she was far more than just a passive subject; she was a creator in her own right, using the Surrealist philosophy to inform her photography, often producing unsettling, dreamlike images that blurred the boundaries between reality and imagination.
By the mid-1930s, Miller had tired of her life in Paris and decided to return to New York, where she opened her own portrait and commercial photography studio. Her studio was a success, and she was commissioned to take photographs for Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, and other prominent publications. However, it was clear that commercial work did not entirely fulfil Miller. She was restless and yearned for new challenges and experiences. In 1934, she married Egyptian businessman Aziz Eloui Bey and moved to Cairo, hoping that the change of scenery might bring some sense of satisfaction. But life in Egypt, although beautiful, soon proved stifling for Miller, who felt increasingly trapped in a world where her creative energy had no outlet.
It was during a trip back to Europe in the late 1930s that Miller’s life took yet another turn. In London, she met and fell in love with Roland Penrose, a British artist and key figure in the Surrealist movement. Her marriage to Bey began to disintegrate, and Miller decided to stay in London with Penrose. In 1939, with the outbreak of the Second World War, her life took on a new sense of purpose. The conflict presented an opportunity for Miller to engage with the world in a way that commercial photography never had. She volunteered as a freelance war correspondent for Vogue, documenting the impact of the Blitz on London and capturing the resilience of the city’s inhabitants amidst the bombings.
This was a pivotal moment in Miller’s life. The glamour and surrealism of her earlier work gave way to a stark, unflinching realism as she began documenting the horrors of war. Armed with her camera, Miller embarked on a journey through the war-torn landscapes of Europe, capturing some of the most harrowing images of the 20th century. She was one of only a few women permitted to enter the front lines as a war correspondent, and her work took her to places few civilians, let alone women, had ever been.
Miller travelled with American troops across Europe, documenting their experiences and the devastation left in the wake of the conflict. Her images were both powerful and haunting, offering an unvarnished glimpse into the brutal reality of war. One of her most famous series of photographs was taken in Normandy, shortly after the D-Day landings, where she captured the experiences of American soldiers as they liberated occupied towns. These images were remarkable not only for their technical prowess but also for their emotional depth, revealing the human cost of the war in a way that few other photographers of the time were able to do.
As the Allies advanced into Germany, Miller was among the first journalists to document the liberation of the Nazi concentration camps at Buchenwald and Dachau. Her photographs from these camps remain some of the most harrowing and iconic images of the Holocaust. They show the unspeakable horrors that were inflicted upon the prisoners, many of whom were little more than walking skeletons, their faces etched with suffering and despair. Miller’s images of the camps were shocking to the public, but they were also necessary, serving as a stark reminder of the atrocities committed by the Nazis and the importance of bearing witness to history.
In April 1945, Miller’s war coverage took a surreal turn when she and fellow photographer David E. Scherman entered Adolf Hitler’s Munich apartment just hours after his suicide. In a now-famous photograph taken by Scherman, Miller can be seen sitting in Hitler’s bathtub, her combat boots on the floor, symbolically trampling the Führer’s image in a final act of defiance. This photograph encapsulates Miller’s complex relationship with the war and her role as a female photojournalist in a male-dominated field. It also reflects her sense of irony and her refusal to adhere to conventional notions of propriety and decorum, even in the most solemn of circumstances.
In 1947, Miller married Roland Penrose, with whom she had a son, Antony. Penrose was supportive of her work and provided a stable, loving home for her, but Miller’s struggles with depression and alcoholism continued to worsen. Despite this, she remained a central figure in the post-war art world, maintaining close friendships with many of the artists she had known during her time in Paris, including Picasso, who painted her portrait several times. However, by the early 1950s, Miller had all but retired from photography, preferring to retreat into domestic life at Farley Farm, the Sussex home she shared with Penrose.
In her later years, Miller became somewhat reclusive, rarely speaking about her experiences during the war. It was as though the horrors she had witnessed were too great to be revisited, even in conversation. However, she remained engaged with the art world, hosting numerous artists and intellectuals at Farley Farm, which became a kind of informal gathering place for the post-war avant-garde. Though she no longer actively pursued photography, she continued to be a creative force in her own right, experimenting with cooking and surrealist-inspired recipes that blended food and art in strange and imaginative ways.
Miller struggled severely with her mental health. She had continued to work as a photographer for Vogue for several years, but the trauma of the war and the horrors she had witnessed had a profound effect on her. Like many who had been on the front lines, Miller struggled with what would now be recognised as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The disturbing images of the war, particularly the scenes from the Nazi concentration camps, haunted her, and she found it increasingly difficult to reconcile her experiences with her earlier life as a fashion photographer and muse.
To cope with the emotional fallout, Miller turned to alcohol. She also experienced periods of depression, which deepened as she grew older. Though she was surrounded by her family and her husband Roland Penrose, the stability of her home life at Farley Farm in Sussex could not entirely protect her from the psychological scars left by the war. Her son Antony later recalled that she often found it hard to talk about her experiences, and her once sharp and adventurous spirit was dulled by years of inner turmoil.
Miller’s health continued to decline and in 1973, she was diagnosed with breast cancer. Although she underwent treatment, the cancer eventually spread, and her health continued to deteriorate in her final years. Despite her physical decline, Miller remained intellectually curious and engaged with the world around her however, on July 21, 1977, Lee Miller died at her home at Farley Farm in Chiddingly, East Sussex, at the age of 70. The official cause of death was cancer, but the emotional and psychological toll of her experiences during the war had undoubtedly contributed to her physical decline.
Miller’s legacy as a photographer was largely forgotten in the years following her death in 1977. It wasn’t until the 1980s, when her son Antony began to uncover her vast archive of photographs and personal letters, that her extraordinary contributions to both Surrealism and war photography were fully recognised. Today, Miller is celebrated as one of the most important and influential photographers of the 20th century, not only for her technical skill and artistic vision but also for her courage and resilience in the face of unimaginable horrors.
Watch Kate Winslet’s extraordinary bio of Lee Miller if you get the chance.
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