Continues until Saturday 15 February

A remarkable female icon of the 20th century best known as a model and surrealist photographer, this exhibition focuses on one of the least recognised aspects of Lee Miller’s life; her years as a photojournalist during World War II.

Working as a freelance photographer for Vogue, in 1944 Lee Miller became accredited as a war correspondent with the US Army. She was the only woman in combat photojournalism in Europe during the World War II and witnessed the liberation of Paris, the Russian/American link up in Torgau and was one of the first to arrive at Buchenwald and Dachau concentration camps.

The exhibition coincides with the University's Holocaust Memorial Week from Monday 27 January to Friday 31 January with numerous events, talks, filmscreenings, performances and activities being held over the five days. See the full full programme for Holocaust Memorial Week

Lee Miller’s photographs function not only as historical records but as powerful images in their own right that unforgettably sear into the memory. Fellow photographer David E Scherman said, “Lee Miller was never afraid of the evil that men can do”, and perhaps it was this that allowed her to keep on photographing, despite witnessing some of mankind’s worst acts of inhumanity. This exhibition of a selection of Lee Miller’s war photographs offer an insight into her way of seeing - informed perhaps by her surrealist background - whereby individual character is always allowed the space to be revealed.

Lee Miller’s War is part of the University of Essex’s focus on the Holocaust during January 2014.