Mary Ellen Mark studied painting and art history at the University of Pennsylvania, before completing a masters in photojournalism at the Annenberg School for Communication. In 1963, she started focusing on socially critical narrative photography and embarked on projects around the world. She expanded commissions into independent projects over many years and published the resulting photographs in leading magazines. Later, the photographs were included in over twenty thematic monographs. Mark taught workshops and received many international fellowships and prestigious awards for her work before she died at the age of 75.