Mike disfarmer biography

American photographer (–)

Mike Disfarmer (born Mike Meyer, –) was an American photographer known for his portraits of everyday people in rural Arkansas from the s to the s.

His stark, realist photographs were rediscovered in the s and later came to be regarded as works of art.

Mike disfarmer biography

Because of his status outside of the artistic mainstream, Disfarmer's photographs are considered an example of Outsider art.

Biography

Born Mike Meyer in Indiana, he moved with his family to Arkansas in He later moved to the town of Heber Springs, Arkansas at the age of thirty, where roughly a decade later he would build and operate his photography studio.

Meyer changed his name to Disfarmer while in his 50s, claiming that he was adopted by the Meyers (Disfarmer is a direct reference to Meyer, an archaic German term for farmer).^[1] Disfarmer never married, and he lived alone in the photography studio until his death in While there is speculation that he was eccentric and e