Ric Savid was born in New York City, earned a BA from Rollins College in 1976, then served two years in the U.S. Peace Corps in the Philippines. Savid earned a master’s in journalism from Columbia University in 1982, then worked as a police reporter for the former St. Petersburg Times in Florida. Savid is a self-taught photographer who shoots all his images under existing light and prints in the wet-process darkroom. He has taught darkroom photography at various art centers in the Tampa Bay area and to at-risk children for the Juvenile Welfare Board of Pinellas County, Florida. Savid’s work has appeared in American Photo, Aperture, Black and White, and Focus magazines. He has been awarded multiple grants. In 2007, two images won first and second prize in the Prix De La Photographie in Paris. In 2011, he was the city of Tampa’s Photo Laureate. Savid and his wife Merla live in Clearwater, Florida, where he works part time as a home health nurse. In 2024 he was named the second SPMOP Photo Laureate.
