Marcus Yam is a roving Los Angeles Times foreign correspondent and staff photographer. Born and raised in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, he left a career in aerospace engineering to become a photographer. His goal: to take viewers to the frontlines of conflict, struggle and intimacy.
His approach is deeply rooted in curiosity, dignity and persistence. In 2022, Yam won the Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News Photography for images documenting the U.S. departure from Afghanistan that capture the human cost of the historic change in the country. Yam is a two-time recipient of the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Journalism Award, notably in 2019, for his unflinching body of work showing the everyday plight of Gazans during deadly clashes in the Gaza Strip. He was also part of two Pulitzer Prize-winning breaking news teams that covered the San Bernardino, Calif., terrorist attacks in 2015 for the Los Angeles Times and the deadly landslide in Oso, Wash. in 2014, for the Seattle Times.
His work has also been recognized by the Emmy Award for News and Documentary, an Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Award, World Press Photo Award, DART Award for Trauma Coverage, Scripps Howard Visual Journalism Award, Picture of the Year International’s Newspaper Photographer of the Year Award, Society of Professional Journalists’ Sigma Delta Chi Award, Society of Publishers in Asia Award and National Headliner Awards.
Prior to the Los Angeles Times, Marcus was based in New York and worked as a regular contributor to The New York Times. His most notable work includes his contributions to "Punched Out: The Life and Death of a Hockey Enforcer" – The Times's three-part multimedia series and "A Year At War" – a Times year-long series that included a feature short film, "The Home Front.” It taught him many important storytelling lessons and helped him understand how essential journalism is in the digital world.
And when he is not working, Yam likes minimizing and organizing his life for efficiency and for emergencies. He enjoys hiking up a mountain and learning how to photograph on film with vintage cameras.