Vivian Maier

When I opened my email VERY early yesterday morning (it may have qualified as the night before), I had a query from Rhonda Prince about a photographic matter. Her email led me to a website that I perused for a while. Then I came to this and I was had (does anyone still say such a thing?). Nothing in recent memory has had the impact on me that the story and photos of Vivian Maier. John Maloof who discovered her work tells us this:

"I acquired Vivian's negatives while at a furniture and antique auction. From what I know, the auction house acquired her belongings from her storage locker that was sold off due to delinquent payments. I didn't know what 'street photography' was when I purchased them."

He says that approximately 30-40,000 developed negatives and about 10-15,000 negatives still waiting to be processed were in the boxes he purchased. He is now making the images public on the website he has made to display her work.

From what he could find out, she was a Jew from France who suffered through World War II then made her way to the United States in the 1950's. From that time through the 1970's, she took to the street with her camera and made the heartbreakingly beautiful photographs that Maloof purchased.

Go to the website and read the rest of the story. That Ms. Maier made such a considerable visual document of American society without recognition or obvious artistic support for so many years is astonishing. Surely her work will find its way into museum collections where it will take its place in the pantheon beside the photographs of Robert Frank and Diane Arbus. Go. Look. Be amazed. Tell a friend.

I wrote to Mr. Maloof right away and asked if I could use a few of the images from his site to make my post. He graciously wrote back immediately and gave his permission. His is an active site to which I will return each day in order to watch this mystery unfold. Thanks, Rhonda, for pointing me toward this incredible story, and thank you Mr. Maloof for presenting us all with this revelation.