Born in North Carolina, Michael Childers attended UCLA Film School where he directed student films and began his photography career studying with Robert Heineken and Edmund Teske. Michael created the mixed media work for the record-breaking run of the off-Broadway musical Oh! Calcutta! for Kenneth Tynan, leading to an invitation for photographic work at Sir Laurence Olivier’s National Theater in London.  He remains the only American photographer invited to do so. He was a founding photographer for Andy Warhol’s Interview and After Dark magazines; and produced Dance magazine covers featuring the Joffrey Ballet, The Royal Ballet, and Alvin Ailey Dance Company, and co-authored Bejart: The World of Dance.

From his LA studios, Michael photographed 200+ magazine covers including GQ, New York, TV Guide, Esquire, Los Angeles, Elle, Paris Match, Life, London Sunday Times Magazine, and English and Italian Vogue. He created 150+ album covers and film posters for major studios and worked as a photographer on many films.

In 2003, the Palm Springs Desert Museum presented a forty-year retrospective of Michael’s work, Icons and Legends. In 2006, La Dolce Vita: The Photography of Michael Childers, was exhibited at the Los Angeles Film Festival; the Palm Springs Art Museum presented Celebration of Three Hollywood Photographers: George Hurrell, Sid Avery, In 2007, Rockin’ Hollywood at the Queen Mary Gallery, Long Beach featured portraits of rock-and-roll icons and music legends. Author Author, featuring Childers’ images of celebrated authors, playwrights, poets and screenwriters, was exhibited in a dozen major U.S. libraries, including the Beinecke Library Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University and the Monroe C. Gutman Library at Harvard University. 

His photos are in the collections of the National Portrait Gallery; Victoria & Albert Museum; British Film Institute Library in London; Palm Springs Art Museum; the University of Texas at Austin – Harry Ransom Center; UC Riverside Photography Museum, Laguna Art Museum; Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; Marion Center for the Photographic Arts, Santa Fe; Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, Beverly Hills; Lincoln Center Library for the Performing Arts; San Luis Obispo Museum of Art; Seattle Art Museum; Scripps College Museum of Art; Santa Barbara Museum of Art; Marquette University Art Gallery, Milwaukee; Santa Monica Museum of Art; Yale University Beinecke Library; Yale Center of British Art; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; and the Cal State Fullerton Art Gallery.