Larry Towell's experience as a poet and a folk musician have done much to shape his personal style. The son of a car repairman, Towell grew up in a large family in rural Ontario, Canada. During studies in visual arts at Toronto’s York University, he was given a camera and taught how to process black and white film.
In 1984, he became a freelance photographer and writer focusing on the dispossessed, exile and peasant rebellion. Significant bodies of work include the Nicaraguan Contra war, the relatives of the disappeared in Guatemala, ten years of reportage in El Salvador, and an 11-year project on the Mennonite migrant workers of Mexico. He became a Magnum nominee in 1988 and a full member in 1993.
