Vivian Maier

Streetwise ”Mary Poppins” Never Missed a Shot!

by Tobe Damit

Vivian Maier never displayed publicly any of her pictures while she was alive but left behind a very impressive collection of photographs. She was never published and many of her negatives were never even printed while she was alive. Impressive in quantity for sure, but also in terms of quality. Vivian Maier’s photos have this ethereal but also very human quality to it,  a sense of tragedy, a sense of humanity, an eye for the details, the framing and a perfect timing, all this coupled with a dark and bizarre edge.

An American of French and Austro-Hungarian extraction, Vivian bounced between Europe and the United States before coming back to New York City in 1951. Having picked up photography just two years earlier, she would comb the streets of the Big Apple refining her artistic craft. By 1956 Vivian left the East Coast for Chicago, where she’d spend most of the rest of her life working as a caregiver. In her leisure Vivian would shoot photos that she zealously hid from the eyes of others. Taking snapshots into the late 1990′s, Maier would leave behind a body of work comprising over 100,000 negatives. Additionally Vivian’s passion for documenting extended to a series of homemade documentary films and audio recordings.

Vivian Maier was a very secretive, mysterious person and if John Maloof wouldn’t have gambled 400$ at an auction, buying a full box of negatives without even looking at them first, nobody would have gotten the chance to see the amazing pictures that gained this unconditional sympathy Vivian seems to be getting from a constantly growing number of admirers. Trusting his gut instinct about this woman who had now passed away, leaving behind her a huge trail of clues (she was a pack rat!) that would be very helpful for anyone who would try to know as much as you can possibly know about a person who is now deceased, Maloof proceeded to not only connect the dots about her life but also, and maybe more importantly, to have her works revealed to the public. With the help of a few people, he started to devote his life to this arduous and challenging task: put the name Vivian Maier in history books. This article is my way of helping him to do exactly that because I truly think that’s where her name belongs. I want her to have the posthumous love and recognition she never had during her life.

Now there is a documentary about her written and directed by
John Maloof and Charlie Siskel, books and numerous exhibitions and events occuring all around the world as we speak but much of the art world establishment still hasn’t accepted Vivian Maier’ work. She didn’t defend herself as an artist, she just did the work and it’s so good that it’s winning over people who were dismissive of it previously and fortunately people aren’t waiting for that kind of validation anyway. They don’t care and they are already claiming Vivian’s work for themselves and her work can now be seen around the world. 

‘Nuf said, here are a few pictures I chose, a very small part of the very legacy Vivian Maier left behind for us.  You can also watch for free the documentary called ”Finding Vivian Maier” that reveals the incredible story of this mysterious nanny, who loved taking pictures.  But let’s have a look at the pictures first.

All photos credits Vivian Maier/ John Maloof Collection