Finding Vivian Maier
finding Vivian Maier
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History
Discovery Research
About Vivian Maier
Early year Later year
Portfolios Street Portrait Self-Portraits Color
finding Vivian Maier
01History Discovery
history
After John Maloof purchased his first home
Pogorzelski, were forced to look everywhere for
and pursued a career in real estate in 2005, he
any old photographs good enough to make the
began to get more involved in the community
cut. The result was a nearly year-long scavenger
where he lived. He delved heavily into historic
hunt where they followed lead after lead to
preservation and eventually became the
compile the pictures needed for the book.
president of the local historical society on
It was during this process that John visited a
Chicago’s Northwest Side. Given that this part
local auction house, RPN, to see if by chance,
of the city is often ignored, he came to believe
they would have any material for the book up
that by writing a book on the neighborhood, he
for auction. Sure enough, he found a box of
could work to promote awareness of its often
negatives depicting Chicago in the 60’s. Unable
overlooked charm. It was this decision to co-
to get a thorough look at its contents, he took a
author the book Portage Park that would change
gamble and purchased the box for around $400.
his life forever.
After he and his co-author looked through the
The publisher required approximately 220
negatives, they found nothing relevant for the
high-quality vintage photos of the neighborhood
project so John put them in a closet until after
for the book. To gather enough images for
the book was completed. After some time,
this project, John and his co-author, Daniel
he revisited the negatives and started to scan
finding Vivian Maier admit this to others at first, but he had become
were historic in nature (he had absolutely no
obsessed with Vivian’s work, and made it his
background in photography to know what to
mission to re-construct her archive.
look for). John became inspired to pick up his
Over the course of a year, John managed to save
point-and-shoot camera and document the city
about 90% of her work from the other buyers at
the way this photographer had. Photography
the original auction to accumulate a collection
became a new passion and he became a
of 100,000 to 150,000 negatives, more than
photographer.
3,000 prints, hundreds of rolls of film, home
If we fast forward about a year later, John’s
movies, audio tape interviews, and various
point-and-shoot camera is a long gone and
other items. Another collector, Jeff Goldstein,
he’s on the streets with a Rolleiflex, just like
managed to salvage the rest.
Vivian Maier. By that time, he had taken it upon
After creating a blog showing about 100
himself to take a crash course on photography
photos of her work that nobody visited for
to pick up what he could about its history and
months, he posted a discussion on Flickr to the
its masters. John created a darkroom in his
group HCSP, and the response and traffic was
attic and set out to learn the process of printing
overwhelming. Since then, he’s been on a non-
and developing film. Maloof was ashamed to
stop schedule of archiving, promoting, and preserving Vivian Maier’s work.
history
them. The images that caught his attention
finding Vivian Maier
history
finding Vivian Maier history
suitcases and shoes beloning to Maier.
research
finding Vivian Maier
Vivian Maier (February 1, 1926 – April 21, 2009) was an American street photographer born in New York City. Although born in the U.S., it was in France that Maier spent most of her youth. Maier returned to the U.S. in 1951 where she took up work as a nanny and care-giver for the rest of her life. In her leisure however, Maier had begun to venture into the art of photography. Consistently taking phovtos over the course of five decades, she would ultimately leave over 100,000 negatives, most of them shot in Chicago and New York City. Vivian would further indulge in her passionate devotion to documenting the world around her through homemade films, recordings and collections, assembling one of the
about Vivian Maier
most fascinating windows into American life in the second half of the twentieth century.
02
About Vivian Maier
Maier was born to a French mother and Austrian father in the Bronx borough of New York City. The census records although useful, give us an incomplete picture. We find Vivian at the age of four living in NYC with only her mother along with Jeanne Bertrand, an award winning portrait photographer, her father was
finding Vivian Maier
Early years
already out of the picture. Later records show Vivian returning
1939
to the U.S. from France in 1939 with her mother, Marie Maier. Again in 1951 we have records of her subsequent return home
1949
Sometime in 1949, while still in France, Vivian began toying with her first photos. Her camera was a modest Kodak Brownie box camera, an amateur camera with only one shutter speed, no focus control, and no aperture dial. The viewer screen is tiny, and for the controlled landscape or portrait artist, it would arguably impose a wedge in between Vivian and her intentions due to its inaccuracy. Her intentions were at the mercy of this
1951
feeble machine. In 1951, Maier returns to NY on the steamship ‘De-Grass’, and she nestles in with a family in Southampton as a nanny.
1952
In 1952, Vivian purchases a Rolleiflex camera to fulfill her fixation. She stays with this family for most of her stay in New York until 1956, when she makes her final move to the North Shore suburbs of Chicago. Another family would employ Vivian as a nanny for their three boys and would become her closest family for the remainder of her life.
about Vivian Maier
from France, this time however, without her mother.
finding Vivian Maier
Later years 1956
In 1956, when Maier moved to Chicago, she enjoyed the luxury of a darkroom as well as a private bathroom. This allowed her to process her prints and develop her own rolls of B&W film. As the children entered adulthood, the end of Maier’s employment from that first Chicago family in the early seventies forced her to abandon developing her own film. As she would move from family to family, her rolls of undeveloped, unprinted work began to collect. It was around this time that Maier decided to switch to color
about Vivian Maier
photography, shooting on mostly Kodak Ektachrome 35mm film, using a Leica IIIc, and various German SLR cameras. The color work would have an edge to it that hadn’t been visible in Maier’s work before that, and it became more abstract as time went on. People slowly crept out of her photos to be replaced with found objects, newspapers, and graffiti. Similarly, her work was showing a compulsion to save items she would find in garbage cans or lying beside the curb.
1980
In the 1980s Vivian would face another challenge with her work. Financial stress and lack of stability would once again put her processing on hold and the color Ektachrome rolls began to pile. Sometime between the late 1990’s and the first years of the new millennium, Vivian would put down her camera and keep her belongings in storage while she tried to stay afloat. She bounced from homelessness to a small studio apartment which a family she used
finding Vivian Maier
to work for helped to pay. With meager means, the photographs in storage became lost memories until they were sold off due to nonpayment of rent in 2007. The negatives were auctioned off by the storage company to RPN Sales, who parted out the boxes in a much
2007
larger auction to several buyers including John Maloof.
2008
In 2008 Vivian fell on a patch of ice and hit her head in downtown Chicago. Although she was expected to make a ull recovery, her passed away a short time later in April of 2009, leaving behind her immense archive of work.
2009
about Vivian Maier
health began to deteriorate, forcing Vivian into a nursing home. She
finding Vivian Maier
Personal life
1956 about Vivian Maier Often described as ‘Mary-Poppin’s’, Vivian Maier had eccentricity on her side as a nanny for three boys who she raised like a mother. Starting in 1956, working for a family in an upper-class suburb of Chicago along Lake Michigan’s shore, Vivian had a taste of motherhood. She’d take the boys on trips to strawberry fields to pick berries. She’d find a dead snake on the curb and bring it home to show off to the boys or organize plays with all of the children on the block. Vivian was a free spirit and followed her curiosities wherever they led her.
Having told others she had learned English from theaters and plays, Vivian’s ‘theater of life’ was acted out in front of her eyes for her camera to capture in the most epic moments. Vivian had an interesting history. Her family was completely out of the picture very early on in her life, forcing her to become singular, as she would remain for the rest of her life. She never married, had no children, nor any very close friends that could say they “knew” her on a personal level.
because of an emotional kinship she felt with those struggling to get by. Her thirst to be cultured led her around the globe. At this point we know of trips to Canada in 1951 and 1955, in 1957 to South America, in 1959 to Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, in 1960 to Florida, in 1965 she’d travel to
1965
the Caribbean Islands, and so on. It is to be noted that she traveled alone and gravitated toward the less fortunate in society. Her travels to search out the exotic caused her to seek out the unusual in her own backyard as well. Whether it was the overlooked sadness of Yugoslavian émigrés burying their Czar, the final go-around at the legendary stockyards, a Polish film screening at the Milford Theater’s Cinema Polski, or Chicagoans welcoming home the Apollo Crew, she was a one-person documenting impresario, documenting what caught her eye, in photos, film and sound. The personal accounts from people who knew Vivian are all very similar. She was eccentric, strong, heavily opinionated, highly intellectual, and intensely private. She wore a floppy hat, a long dress, wool coat, and men’s shoes and walked with a powerful stride. With a camera around her neck whenever she left the house, she would obsessively take pictures, but never showed her photos to anyone. An unabashed and unapologetic original.
about Vivian Maier
1951
finding Vivian Maier
Maier’s photos also betray an affinity for the poor, arguably
finding Vivian Maier
Photography
All of the images that you’ll find on this website are not from prints made by Maier, but rather from new scans prepared from Vivian’s negatives. This naturally leads one to the issue of artistic intent. What would Vivian have printed? How? These are valid concerns, the reason utmost attention has
about Vivian Maier
been given to learn the styles she favored in her work. It required meticulously studying the prints that Maier, herself, had printed, as well as the many, many notes given to labs with instructions on how to print and crop, what type of paper, what finish on the paper, etc. Some of Maier’s print instructions Whenever her work has been exhibited, such as for the exhibit at the Chicago Cultural Center, this information is factored in mind to interpret her work as closely as possible to her original process.
finding Vivian Maier about Vivian Maier
Vivian Maier’s bathroom doubled as a darkroom.
Vivian Maier’s Kodak Brownie
finding Vivian Maier
03
Portfolio
portfolio
portfolio
finding Vivian Maier
the Rolieflex is a great finding Vivian Maier
disguss camera because
it wasn't up here by the eye
where she had to alert somebody on the street that she's
photographing.
portfolio
May 1953.
New York, NY
finding Vivian Maier portfolio
there's a picture of a guy. he's an ordinary street guy,but he has a power and dignity. He's standing there, and he's looking at her.
finding Vivian Maier
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finding Vivian Maier
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finding Vivian Maier
May 16, 1957. Chicago
portfolio This silent , aimless chronicler, wander the streets.
January 26, 1955. New York portfolio
finding Vivian Maier
she walks confidently, picks scenes up at
finding Vivian Maier portfolio "oh,god! what is she doing?" why is she taking picture of me?"
portfolio
finding Vivian Maier
New York, NY
September 1956.
finding Vivian Maier
September 1953. New York
wwhen she looked at the twisted beggar in the corner of the street
portfolio
finding Vivian Maier portfolio
she just watched,lower her head, cooperating her camera.
finding Vivian Maier portfolio lonliness , depression she sees the bizzareness of life the unappealingness of human beings.
August 22, 1956. Chicago portfolio
finding Vivian Maier
1960ďźŒ unknown date
finding Vivian Maier portfolio this picture gives me a sense of movie shot. an unfamiliar women she glanced at the camera lense and walked by in hurry.
finding Vivian Maier portfolio
Emmett Kelly as the clown figure “Weary Willie�
finding Vivian Maier portfolio
she sees the bizzareness of life the incongruity of life
the unappealingness of human beings.
finding Vivian Maier portfolio peacefulness is another theme of Vivian's picture.
Undated
finding Vivian Maier portfolio
the picture conveys the intimacy and privacy of lovers
1953, New York
finding Vivian Maier
portfolio
portfolio
finding Vivian Maier
finding Vivian Maier portfolio
55
ar i t , 91
t
S e l f roP
most of Vivian's portraits are her self-prtrait
55
P o r t r ai t
portfolio
19
finding Vivian Maier
f el S
portfolio
finding Vivian Maier
finding Vivian Maier
portfolio
Self-Portrait, 1961
finding Vivian Maier portfolio what her favorite is every kind of mirrors on the street.
finding Vivian Maier
portfolio
even
a
little
piece
of
mirror
on the ground.
Self Portrait
Undated
1955 finding Vivian Maier
May 5th,
portfolio
Self Portrait