Edgar de Evia born 29 July 1910 (d. 2003)Edgar Domingo Evia y Joutard, known professionally as Edgar de Evia, was a Mexican-born American photographer.
De Evia was born in Mérida, Yucatán, Mexico. His mother was a French-born concert pianist and his father was a wealthy landowner who was a member of two families that have been prominent in the politics and culture of Yucatán since the mid-19th century.
On 30 June 1912, at the age of two, Evia arrived with his family in New York City aboard the liner Progreso. He graduated from The Dalton School in 1931.
Edgar served as the research assistant to Dr. Guy Beckley Stearns, a homeopathic physician with whom he wrote and published articles and one book about homeopathy. The doctor gave Edgar his first camera and taught him to use it.
He is best known for his Tissot-like effects using soft focus and diffusion. His career was long - from the 1940s through to the 1990s -and took in a full range of commercial and fashion photography for various newspapers, magazines and advertising campaigns for corporate clients.For almost two decades his home and studios were on the top three floors of 867 Madison Avenue in the Rhinelander Mansion, which he shared with his partner Robert Denning. and which is now Ralph Lauren's Madison Avenue flagship store.
Later in his career he founded and was the creative director for a company that took all of the photographs for a number of department store catalogues.
During the last decade of his life he wrote several novels and many short stories. He also applied his artistry to digital artwork on his Power Mac. The only common denominator was that none of his drawings looked like computer art. He died just short of his 93rd birthday when pneumonia set in after a fractured hip.
In the 1950s, de Evia's companion and business partner was Robert Denning, who worked in his studio and who would become a leading American interior designer and partner in the firm Denning & Fourcade. From 1966 until de Evia's death, his companion and business partner was David McJonathan-Swarm.