Mark Markov-Grinberg was born on November 27, 1907 in Rostov-on-Don. He belongs to the second generation of Soviet photojournalists.  He learned photography while in secondary school, his first job was in 1925 for the newspaper Soviet South. At that time he also freelanced for national illustrated magazine Ogonyok. Markov-Grinberg photographed Mayakovsky who vistied Rostov in 1926. The same year Markov-Grinberg left Rostov for Moscow where initially he worked as a reporter for several trade union newspapers and the magazine Smena. In 1930 he received an offer to work for the Telegraph Agency of the Soviet Union (TASS), there he was given a heavy Nettel 9 x 12 cm camera and traveled around the country. Markov-Grinberg photographs appeared in all major Soviet publications, including USSR in Construction. From 1931 he switched to Leica.  In 1934, Markov-Grinberg was commissioned to create a photo essay about a day in the life of the minor Nikita Izotov. Under the leadership of the Union Photo editor Mezhericher, Markov-Grinberg was to show a progressive man and a good life of Soviet minors. Markov-Grinberg lived for six months with the Izotov family to create an image of a Socialist hero. Izotov articles appeared in Soviet Photo throughout 1934. The published photo essay circulated in Europian publications, including AIZ. Izotov launchend Markov-Grinberg's career as a Stalin-era photographer and he became one of the most important Soviet (Jewish) reporters of the second generation of Soviet photographers (alongside Georgy Zelma and Emmanuil Evzerikhin). In September of 1941 he was drafted to fight in WW II first as a soldier and then from 1943 as the army correspondent for the military publication Slovo Boitsa (Word of Soldier).  His most famous war image is one of a hand coming out of an oven at Stutthof (1945). After the war, during the anticosmopolitan compaign Markov-Grinberg lost his job with TASS in 1948. He worked for VDNKh and Klub i  Khudozhestvennaya Deyatel'nost (Club and Art Hobby) magazine. He died in Moscow in 2003.