For him the question, above all others, was: Why didn’t Maier share her amazing works of art with others? Professional artists appear on-screen to declare that “had she made herself known, she would have become a famous photographer,” as if it is easy to make oneself known, as if “sharing” is something that today’s art world is even interested in, revolving as it does around asset purchases by the wealthy finessed by a legion of gatekeepers. (The shot below, one of my favorites, is an example of how Maier transcends the comparisons that have been made with photographers like Robert Frank, Lisette Model or Diane Arbus.In the 2013 documentary Finding Vivian Maier, John Maloof, credited with the titular discovery, goes searching for the woman whose beautiful photographs he bought at a storage auction, talking to her friends, her former employers, the children (now grown) that she cared for, a living relative. But she hoarded the raw material for a biography, including films and audio tapes and countless self-portraits, which gives the impression of someone fighting against time to preserve a record of themselves.Īpart from the obvious quality of Maier’s photography, that might be one of the things that’s made her story so fascinating – that someone who worked so hard at her art, who obviously understood the value and skill that it showed, would have hoarded it so zealously and shunned the pursuit of reputation. She might have resented John Maloof and his efforts immensely. Most of the people who knew her say that she wouldn’t have enjoyed the fame she has today when she was alive. Reputation, on the other hand, is something only a living person would care about. (Jones’ glass negatives had been destroyed years earlier his granddaughter recalls him using them to make cloches for young plants.) Even more than with Jones, I identified with Maier I could imagine my own work languishing in storage boxes somewhere after I was gone, and it probably ended up spurring me to post my photos online.īut the question of posterity is only something that becomes important to an artist after their death, when they can’t do anything about it.
It resonated for me, much the way that the story of Charles Jones did fifteen years earlier – a British gardener whose masterful still life prints of fruit and vegetables were discovered in a trunk at an auction. The story of Maier’s rediscovery happened around the time I began my old blog. For some reason, Maier kept her work to herself for decades while working as a nanny and housekeeper for various families (including Phil Donahue’s) and hoarding tons of things besides film negatives – newspaper clippings, clothes, political memorabilia, bus transfers, mail, uncashed cheques, trash – as she moved from place to place. “Had she made herself known she would have become a famous photographer,” said Mary Ellen Mark, while going through Maier’s work with Maloof in Finding Vivian Maier.
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