Walker Evans (American, 1903–1975) was a pioneering photographer best known for his powerful documentation of American life during the Great Depression. Working with a stark, unembellished style, Evans captured vernacular architecture, street scenes, and portraits with a deep sense of clarity and empathy. His collaboration with writer James Agee on Let Us Now Praise Famous Men (1941), portraying tenant farmers in the American South, remains one of the most influential photo-text projects of the 20th century. A longtime contributor to Fortune magazine and later a professor at Yale, Evans shaped the development of documentary photography and left an indelible mark on visual culture.
