19.01.1952 - 21.02.2016

Peter Marlow was an eminent photographer, a member and two-time President of the international photography cooperative, Magnum Photos. He was made an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society in 2006 and his work is held in 12 public collections worldwide.

Born in Kenilworth, outside Coventry, Peter studied psychology at Manchester University, graduating in 1974. His photography career began in 1975 while working on an Italian cruise liner in the Caribbean.

Peter’s work as a photographer spanned 41 years, capturing major world events for prestigious magazines and newspapers and his personal long form projects.

Peter began his career as a photojournalist in 1976 with Paris based agency Sygma, where he covered events in Lebanon and Northern Ireland. He then returned to Britain to examine his home country. Peter’s work showcases multiple facets of English recent history from the unrest in Liverpool to his beautiful and intricate study of Anglican Cathedrals. His archive includes work of international interest as well as shining a light on Britain. The work is inspiring and of deep historical importance.

Peter’s personal long form projects include, the ‘Lewisham Race Riots’, where Peter worked alongside fellow Magnum photographer Chris Steele Perkins to chronicle the rise of the right wing in the late 1970’s including the infamous anti-immigration riots in Lewisham in 1977 where 500 members of the National Front clashed with at least 4000 demonstrators and a massive police presence.

In his long-term study of Liverpool in the 1980’s, ‘Liverpool - Looking Out To Sea’ Peter’s raw photography shows in sharp decline with a devastated inner city and people fighting to survive the effects of government policy. Between 1995 and 1997 he was embedded with Tony Blair, the then leader of the Labour Party on his campaign trail to be Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.

Peter chronicled the garish and stark ‘Japanese Love Hotels’, the Liverpool fans, laying scarves and flowers in respect to the 96 fans who lost their lives in the Hillsborough disaster and the last days of Britain’s greatest engineering success ‘Concorde: The Last Summer’. His powerful long term project documenting the 42 English Anglican Cathedrals, ‘The English Cathedral’ captured for the first time in only the dawn light, is currently touring the 42 Cathedrals and is much loved by visitors.