Wayne F. Miller

Miller studied at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. The recorded working language is English. Work by Wayne F. Miller is recorded in the collections of Minneapolis Institute of Art, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Photography Collection and National Museum of Archeology, History and Art. Distinctions recorded are Guggenheim Fellowship.

• Born — 19 September 1918 • Birthplace — Chicago, Illinois • Died — 22 May 2013 • Place of death — Orinda, California Wayne Forest Miller (September 19, 1918 – May 22, 2013) was an American photographer known for his series of photographs The Way of Life of the Northern Negro. Active as a photographer from 1942 until 1975, he was a contributor to Magnum Photos beginning in 1958.

Miller was born in Chicago, Illinois., the son of a doctor and a nurse, who gave him a camera as a high school graduation present. He went on to study banking at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, while also working on the side as a photographer. From 1941 to 1942 he studied at the Art Centre School of Los Angeles.

• Illustration — Wayne F. Miller: Adm. Lord Louis Mountbatten, RN, addresses personnel aboard the USS Saratoga (CV-3) at Trincomalee, Ceylon

After the war he resettled in Chicago. He won two consecutive Guggenheim fellowships in 1946-1948, with which he worked on The Way of Life of the Northern Negro. These images were published in his book Chicago's South Side, 1946-1948. This project documented the wartime migration of African Americans northward, specifically looking at the black community on the south side of Chicago, covering all the emotions in daily life. The people depicted are mostly ordinary people, but some celebrities appear, such as Lena Horne, Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington and Paul Robeson.

Miller taught at the Institute of Design in Chicago before commissioning a Modernist house for their growing family from architect Mario Corbett in Orinda, California in 1953. He was freelancing for Life and with his wife Joan also worked with Edward Steichen as an associate curator for The Family of Man exhibition and accompanying book which opened at New York City's Museum of Modern Art in 1955. Steichen selected eight of Miller's photographs, including two of the birth of the photographer's son, for the show which traveled the world and was seen by more than 9 million visitors. • Illustration — Wayne F. Miller Grumman TBF wounded crew member Nov 1943 Miller provided the photographs for A Baby's First Year (1956) with Benjamin Spock and John B. Reinhart. Undertaking a three-year project inspired by The Family of Man, he intensively photographed his own family. The resulting book The World is Young was published in 1958 and appeared as a 10-page picture essay in LIFE (13 Oct 1958). Miller was a contract photographer for Life and served as president of Magnum Photos from 1962-1966. Miller was a longtime member of the American Society of Magazine Photographers and was named chairman in 1954. In 2000 Miller was awarded Missouri Honor Medal for Distinguished Service in Journalism, Missouri School of Journalism, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO

In 1970 Miller joined the Corporation for Public Broadcasting as executive director of the Public Broadcasting Environmental Centre. After his retirement from photography in 1975, he co-founded the Forest Landowners of California organisation and worked to protect California's forests, in particular fighting tax laws that encouraged the felling of redwoods.