Avery is best known for his candid photographs of legendary Hollywood celebrities including Elizabeth Taylor, Marlon Brando, Rock Hudson, James Dean, and Audrey Hepburn. Avery's work in the 1950s and '60s was a departure from the glamorized, soft-focus portraits of an earlier Hollywood era when images of the stars were tightly controlled by the major studios. Avery showed celebrities on the movie set between takes and away from the job, relaxing with the family or engaged in household chores.
Among his candid photographs are ones of Marlon Brando taking out the garbage, Rock Hudson emerging from the shower to take a phone call, and Audrey Hepburn riding her bike at Paramount Studios with a shaggy Yorkshire terrier in the basket. Avery's work appeared frequently in Life, Look, Colliers, and The Saturday Evening Post. A collection of his work, ''Hollywood at Home: A Family Album 1950-1965,'' was published by Crown in 1990. The last photograph Avery took was for the cast of Ocean's Eleven in 2001, having captured the Rat Pack in the original feature 40 years earlier, bringing his photographic career full circle. Sid Avery died July 1st, 2002.