Bernard Martin was born on July 26, 1926, in eastern France. After the war, he learned the art of photography in Toulon and settled in Arles with his family in 1953.
In 1954, he began working as a photojournalist for the local newspaper Le Provençal. A year later, he and his wife, Micheline, opened their own photography shop and studio. Their main activities included photojournalism, weddings, school photos, and the sale of photographic equipment. Bernard specialized in aerial and industrial photography, while Micheline managed the shop and the laboratory.
They worked together until their retirement in 1995. On April 1, 1998, Bernard Martin died in a car accident. His wife, a faithful collaborator, classified and protected the thousands of photographic negatives they had accumulated.
Since 2018, their daughter, Dominique Martin, has been digitizing this vast archive, a project that continues to this day