Photograph of Elizabeth Taylor on the set of "Giant," Texas, 1955

Program

BFA 38 Photography and Imaging

Sid Avery originally made his mark as a professional photographer, transforming how Hollywood celebrities were shot by capturing the private moments of such stars as Elizabeth Taylor, James Dean and Audrey Hepburn. Despite his success as a photographer and a television commercial director (through Avery Film Group), his contributions after “retirement” may be the most enduring. Recognizing that the works of many top Hollywood photographers were being lost, Avery founded the Hollywood Photographer’s Archive. This nonprofit organization, dedicated to the preservation of historic prints and negatives, eventually became the Motion Picture and Television Photo Archive (MPTV), a profitable stock agency for photographers past and present. Today MPTV maintains a collection of over one million classic images, available to artists, designers, collectors and historians. During his lifetime, Avery also donated over $8 million worth of historical material to museums, universities and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.