Anya Teixeira

Who was Anya Teixeira?

Anya Teixeira was a Ukrainian-born British street photographer and photojournalist.

Teixeira's family escaped the Russian Revolution in 1917, through a rescue mounted by her uncle Morris Gest, a New York impresario. The family settled in Berlin in 1924 so as to be near at hand for the expected overthrow of the Bolshevik regime. Fifteen years later her family had to flee from the Nazis. Arriving in England in April, 1939, she found that refugees like her were only allowed to be domestic servants or factory workers but she was eventually allowed an office job. She was to be penned into various secretarial positions until her retirement in 1975. Photography was a spare time activity taken up seriously as late as 47. Three years later she co-founded the Creative Photo Group in London which drew approval from the historians Helmut and Alison Gernsheim in their book, "A Concise History of Photography".