The story of the American photographer Vivien Maier is an interesting case of fame that came to the photographer only after her death. Her carefully collected archive of almost a hundred thousand negatives was never seen, it was discovered by accident, and made a real international sensation.
A detailed and original illustration of the life of American society in the 60s and 70s, funny street scenes and surprisingly characteristic portraits do not leave anyone indifferent. In terms of professionalism, the ability to get close to the model and reveal her personality, Mayer is compared with Robert Frank and Lee Friedlander.
Art is eternal and works outlive their creators, who serve only as "guides" between creativity and the viewer. Unfortunately, Mayer's name only became known after her death, and she did not receive the recognition she deserves. Today, Vivien Meyer is glorified by the shots taken with the Rolleiflex medium format camera, with which she almost never parted. Friends called her "Mary Poppins with a camera" - Vivien worked as a governess in wealthy Chicago families.
Perhaps because of the gender and social barriers of the mid-twentieth century, a woman did not try to become famous during her lifetime - or tried, but failed. Today's researchers know very little about her personality and history. This also shows the uniqueness of the photographer - only her work speaks for her, we form an impression of the personality through the prism of talent.
Mayer's style is a careful observation of reality and an accurate "snatching" of interesting and eloquent details from the colorful canvas of American life. Through her work, we can get a complete, three-dimensional idea of how high society looked and what "breathed" the high society and wealthy classes, among which the photographer lived, see what scenes unfolded on the streets and in the parks of Chicago, what the citizens wore and expressed their emotions. .
Mayer's photographs are not impartial illustrations, but formed plots that show the author as an extraordinary storyteller, bright, with a sense of humor and an active social position. Vivien shot at least 200 films a year, developing them in her room (she turned it into a photo lab) - this is the level of a full-fledged professional. At the same time, she also had a main job. She was not going to change it for a career as a photographer, but she carefully systematized and stored the archive. It was discovered completely by accident.
Accidental discovery, posthumous fame and legal scandals
In 2007, 26-year-old Chicago resident John Maloof decided to write a book about his hometown. A professional real estate agent, he happened upon a warehouse sale where he decided to buy some unowned boxes that were being disposed of due to non-payment of space. After paying $400, he received over a hundred thousand shot films and negatives and decided to scan them and develop the photographs. Looking at the finished pictures, he immediately realized that he had a treasure in front of him.
The archive contained superb street photography, 3,000 photo prints, amateur documentaries on 8- and 16-inch film, and tape-recorded interviews with Chicagoans. In addition to the main part, bought by John, there were other pictures in the archive - they were sold to Ron Slattery and Randy Prow. They posted several photos on their blogs, but did not cause a public outcry.
Everything changed when Maloof posted the photos on Flickr. After posting a few pictures on a reputable photoblog, he immediately received about two hundred offers - he was asked to organize exhibitions, make a documentary about the author and tell about her story. John bought the remaining parts of the archive from the co-owners and became the owner of more than 90% of the images and the rights to publish them.
Maloof had to spend a lot of effort to find out who took the photographs that caused such a stir among professionals. Mayer's name was written on one of the boxes John bought. He began to look for relatives and acquaintances of the photographer and was able to contact two families in which she worked as a governess. One of them gave Maloof Vivien's personal belongings - boxes with newspaper clippings, developed photographs and photographic equipment, photo albums that belonged to her, notes and payment documents. According to them and the stories of the pupils, it was possible to restore information about the photographer, since John did not find her living relatives.
Maloof started organizing exhibitions of the photo artist. The first one took place in Norway in 2010, then expositions opened in America and other countries of Europe and Asia. A year later, a book about Mayer, Out of Shadows, was published, and three years later, in 2014, Maloof was sued to protect the rights of the intended heir.
Attorney David Diehl received information that Mayer's cousin Frans Belle lives in France, who, under US law, has the right to her archive. The lawyer demanded to stop the commercial distribution of the photo and said that the pictures were being used illegally. Despite the fact that the current owners of the archive bought the rights from Vivien's found second cousin, Sylvia Jossen, they had to join the lawsuit. One of the reasons for the confusing situation with Mayer's legacy is the lack of knowledge of her biography.
Biography of Vivien Meyer: what the world knows about the brilliant but mysterious reporter
Little is known about the photographer, who was born in New York in 1926. She was the daughter of an Austrian and a Frenchwoman, all her childhood traveling between America, Europe and the village of Saint Bonnet-en-Chansor in the Alps, where she lived with her mother. English was not native to Vivienne, she fully mastered it already in the American period of her life (according to rumors, she went to the theater a lot for this). After her parents divorced in 1930, Vivienne began taking photography lessons from her mother's friend, a professional photographer, spent the years of World War II in France, and then, at the age of twenty-five, returned to the United States. In the 1960s, apparently on the income from the sale of a house in the village, she traveled through Europe, the Middle East and Southeast Asia - from Egypt to Taiwan and Indonesia.
For five years she lived in New York and worked in a candy store, and then changed her profession to work as a governess and moved to Chicago. Mayer lived there until her death, raising children in wealthy families for 40 years. Vivien lived next to one of her pupils for 14 years. The Ginzburg family did not stop communicating with Mayer until her death and even gave her a small apartment in a prestigious area of the city. In addition to this family, Vivienne worked for the wealthy Raymonds and even for the famous American presenter Phil Donahue.
Meyer never parted with the camera, filming social stories about low-income Chicagoans and high society. While walking with children, she photographed street onlookers, passers-by and wealthy acquaintances of her employers posed for her. Always in men's trousers, a wide-brimmed hat and formal shoes, she walked around the city with a camera and worked continuously. Pupils recall that she adhered to socialist views, leaned towards feminism and always sincerely told people the truth in the eye.
The photographer died in 2009, in a nursing home, where she ended up due to a head injury from a fall on the ice. She died shortly before her triumph. We will never know how Mayer would react to the 100% well-deserved fame that came.
I found out about it by accident - I watched some documentary on YouTube, and when it ended, it automatically "passed" to the next one. The film was about this woman, a strange and mysterious photographer, who the world has only recently learned about.
She had no family, children, friends and close relatives. She lived a long life (1926-2009), but very little evidence remains of her - only scattered memories of her many owners, and their children, whom Vivian looked after - she worked as a nanny all her life. And her photos - thousands, thousands of photos! Vivian photographed almost continuously, just everything she saw: children, adults, scenes on the streets, and even garbage in baskets!
Her photographs amaze me ... with dumbness. They are so vital that the absence of sound, color and movement introduces a slight dissonance; it is life itself.
The world learned about Mayer thanks to a young eccentric guy John Maloof, who bought the negatives of the films at an auction for a negligible sum, not knowing what was captured on them. Having printed the photographs, John was struck by their expressiveness and professionalism, the amazing sense of frame and composition that the unknown author possessed. John wanted to acquaint mankind with his discovery.
The problem was that not a single museum recognized the artistic value of the found works, primarily because Vivian herself almost never printed her photographs, she kept only the developed negatives. Museums did not want to print photographs. Then Malouf began to cooperate with one cultural center and organized the first exhibition. The success was enormous! John also became interested in Vivian herself, her life, and began to look for relatives of the photographer who could tell something about her.
It turned out that she was born in a European family - an Austrian father and a French mother. And although Vivian was born in New York, she spent her childhood and youth in Europe. Her native language was French, and she spoke English all her life with an accent. Having finally moved to America, for the first time she lived with a photographer friend, who, apparently, taught Vivian how to take pictures. I must say that distant French relatives still keep Vivian's mother's camera, so she is not the first amateur photographer in the family.
Vivian used a rather expensive Rolleiflex camera. It did not have to be brought to the face, the photographs were taken "from the chest", which did not attract the attention of passers-by.
There was a rather bright period in Vivian's life: she, apparently, received an inheritance from Europe, left her job for 8 months and left to travel. One. Vivian never had a boyfriend, or just a boyfriend, at least no one remembers such a thing. She was ugly, angular, clumsy in her movements and quite tall - more than 175. In addition, Vivian was painfully withdrawn and rather suspicious, which acquired clinical forms with age.
During her travels, she visited South America, Egypt, Thailand, Vietnam and Europe. And I took a lot of photos, of course.
In all the families in which Vivian worked, she is remembered as a "very strange" and some as a "completely sick" woman. One of the former wards claims that Vivian's quirks went beyond the usual eccentricity. So, she could take the little children she looked after to the slum quarter to photograph the life of poor blacks and vagrants. Or, for example, take the baby with you ... to the slaughterhouse.
Some of her pupils remember her without much warmth, she was still the same nanny. One woman said that as a child, Vivien beat her and force-fed her until the girl was 8 years old and she learned to dodge and resist.
Another case was recalled by another family: Vivian witnessed how a kid from this family was hit by a car (not fatally, fortunately). They laid him on his stomach and covered him with a jacket until the ambulance arrived, and Vivian, instead of calming the boy, ran around and took pictures.
Vivian became quite “bad” in her declining years. She was clearly showing signs of paranoia. She covered the windows all the time, being sure that she was being watched. Vivian did not throw anything away, did not allow anyone to enter her room, collected all sorts of rubbish, her dwelling was crammed up to the ceiling with stacked newspapers. Because of these newspapers, she lost her last job: the owners gave some newspapers to a neighbor who was doing repairs, which caused Vivian to have a fit of uncontrollable rage. She made a huge scandal, and this was the last straw. Employers were very sorry for the woman, but they could not trust her to look after the children further. They fired her, but helped her purchase a small home of her own and kept in touch with her for the rest of her life.
Vivian ended her days in a nursing home, but this was only the last year of her life. She took care of herself for a long time, and entered the Nursing Home only after she received an injury. Her neighbors recall an elderly lady who wandered through the park, examining the contents of garbage cans, arguing quietly in French and giving advice to passers-by. She died at the age of 83.
Vivian clearly had no intention of making her photos public. She photographed for herself, she liked the process itself, even the prints of the pictures did not interest her. Perhaps her morbid fantasies required a continuous recording of everything that was happening around her. She sometimes said: "I am a woman of mystery!", Or even reported sometimes that she was a spy.
Her legacy is huge - over 100,000 frames of negatives. Many are still unpublished. In addition, Vivian also made video recordings. Most of her heritage was bought by John Maloof, he was forced to resell part of the archive to the collector Jeff Goldstein, because he simply did not have time to process the materials in such quantity. John is still researching Vivian's life, promoting her heritage by organizing exhibitions. He made a movie about her.
Her photographs are amazing - as if they were taken not by a dry, introverted woman with oddities, but by someone else - cheerful, mischievous and loving life. Maybe she was, but she didn't let anyone see it.
But you can see her photos:
Some of the photos are taken from the website.
Vivian Maier was virtually unknown during her lifetime, but she will go down in history as one of the most iconic photographers along with the names of such masters as Robert Frank and Henri Cartier-Bresson. The documentary “Finding Vivian Mayer” was nominated for an Oscar, by which time Mayer herself and her life story had already captivated the public, after her impressive work was found several years ago, circled the entire Internet and spread like wildfire. Despite the fact that the film never received the coveted Oscar, Mayer fans around the world can be sure that the woman who held the camera in her hands achieved the recognition that her extraordinary talent deserved.
Mayer was born February 1, 1926 in New York City to an Austrian father and a French mother, and spent most of her childhood traveling between France and the United States. In 1956, she settled in Chicago, where she spent the next 40 years working as a nanny. Later, one of the children she looked after would compare her to the "real living Mary Poppins", as she was eccentric, progressive, and also an absolute individualist who liked to seek adventure, draw her own conclusions, take her charges to the poor areas of Chicago to show them that there is another world that they do not know.
On her weekends, the nanny would go outside armed with her precious Rolleiflex, a double-lens reflex camera. Over the years, she has taken a very large number of photographs that give us a glimpse into urban life in the 1950s and 60s. Basically, black-and-white shots of Chicago, New York and other major American cities contained portraits of ordinary people. The wonderful shots reflected Mayer's amazing curiosity, her spontaneity and flair as she practically documented local architecture, street scenes and moments from everyday life. Meyer seemed to be particularly drawn to the outskirts of wealth and adulthood—a child playing in the dirt, a homeless man rummaging through a garbage heap, a haggard-looking black maid—perhaps she felt some special kinship with those who has gone through a lot or will have to.
Mayer continued to photograph in the 90s, gradually accumulating a huge collection of old negatives, she also had raw film, all of which she kept packed in a box in storage. The older and poorer she got, the more difficult it was for her to stay afloat financially. When Mayer was about to be evicted from her home in the suburb of Cicero (Illinois, USA), the Gainsburg brothers, whom she raised several decades ago as a nanny, found her a better apartment. In 2008, Mayer had an accident, one day in downtown Chicago, she slipped on the ice, fell and hit her head. Despite the fact that doctors predicted a full recovery, her health began to deteriorate, and she was placed in a nursing home. Mayer passed away on April 21, 2009, leaving behind a huge archive of work that was nearly lost forever.
Only one person had the honor to shed light on the photographs of the photographer. In 2007, one of Mayer's storage cells was sold at auction because Mayer was unable to pay rent. Looking for material on Chicago in the 60s, he could use her photographs to create his book, so former real estate agent John Maloof bought a box of Mayer negatives, not knowing the true value of what lay inside. He began to scan images and soon vowed to reconstruct her entire archive in order to show the world her beautiful pictures. He managed to buy back about 90 percent (over 100,000 negatives) of Mayer's work at auction, while fellow collector Jeff Goldstein managed to keep the rest. Maloof tried to find out more about the life of the enigmatic photographer, but this search was unsuccessful until he found an obituary on the Internet shortly after Mayer's death. In October of that year, Maloof shared his acquired collections with the Flickr community, which brought him almost instant fame and sparked a frenzy of interest in Mayer's life and work.
Now, nearly six years after Mayer's death, and half a century after some of her photographs were taken, the nanny-turned-photographer is recognized around the world for her contribution to street photography and documenting American life. To learn more about Meyer, watch the documentary Finding Vivian Meyer, or visit her official website.
Only at the end of 2007, the work of Vivian Mayer was discovered by a local Chicago historian and collector, John Maloof. After that, her work began to rapidly spread throughout the network. Numerous awards and exhibitions around the world followed, but, unfortunately, on April 21, 2009, Vivian Mayer passed away.
© Vivian Maier
After returning from France, Mayer worked in a sweatshop. At the age of 25, she took a job as a nanny for a family of 14 and often roamed the streets of Chicago taking portraits of people with her precious Rolleiflex camera. John Maloof accidentally discovered Mayer's work through an auction. With his highly artistic eyes, he saw brilliant photographs from a completely different era.
© Vivian Maier
What makes Vivian Maier's work different
If you think about it, what most admires in these photographs is the choice of subjects for portraiture and masterfully played with light.
The manifestation of art in street photography is perhaps the only way that everyone can admire your work. And there is a feeling that Mayer's photographs of this genre are easily understood by an admiring viewer.
Like many modern street photographers, Mayer not only filled the frame, but also paid attention to the quality of the light and emphasized the dignity of the person depicted.
You can feel the courage of the photographer who pushes her out of her comfort zone to meet strangers on the street. Building relationships within photography is also one of the facets of her work.
The most important portraits are those that stand out in a photographer's portfolio. Mayer's work is bold and brilliant. Her street portraits retain their essence and characteristic charm.
The photographer's work style is inspiring. She spoke to the subjects to capture them. Not everyone thinks about this detail these days. It is a form of humble appreciation and a sense of comfort that could be given to the subject.
The composition in these photos is simple and elegant. Vivian Maier's work is a master class in positioning objects in a frame.
© Vivian Maier
© Vivian Maier
© Vivian Maier
© Vivian Maier
© Vivian Maier
© Vivian Maier
© Vivian Maier
© Vivian Maier
© Vivian Maier
© Vivian Maier
Finding Vivian Maier - official video
A documentary about the search for a woman and a master of photography. The people involved in the story appear throughout the film.
Vivian Mayer - street photographer and nanny
A wonderful narration on the popular television talk show Tonight Show in Chicago about the beauty of Mayer's photographs and the photographer's life story.
Search Vivian Mayer
Continuation of the same story. Here, even more attention is paid to Mayer's work and even more detailed information about her life. A beautiful documentary about this photographer.
Vivian Maier(English) Vivian Maier, 1926 - 2009) - American photographer. She was engaged in photography all her conscious life, took more than 150,000 pictures, but at the same time she never showed them publicly and kept her passion secret from her friends. She became famous after her death in 2009.
Biography
Vivian Maier was born in New York (USA) on February 1, 1926. Even before 1930, her father, for unknown reasons, left the family (perhaps temporarily). In the 1930 census, he is listed under the name Jean Bertrand. It is also known that he was a photographer and may have known Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney (founder of the Whitney Museum of American Art). Vivian's mother Marie Jasso- was French and in 1935 she took Vivian to her homeland, to the commune of Saint-Julien-en-Chansor. However, even before 1940 they returned back to New York.
Although Vivian Mayer was born in the USA, English was not her first language and she learned it when she returned from France. John Maloof (Eng. John Maloof, researcher of the life and work of Vivian Mayer, director of her documentary "Looking for Vivian Mayer") claimed that she studied English by visiting theaters in New York. It is also known that for some time she lived with her friend Jeanne Bertrand, who was a professional photographer and probably had a certain influence on her.
Until 1951, Mayer moved frequently between the United States and France, and only at the age of 25 did she finally move to New York. A little later, in 1956, she left for Chicago and began working there as a nanny.
For the next 40 years, Vivian Mayer lived with various families and worked as a nanny (including the family of the famous American producer Phil Donahue). She was described as an introverted, eccentric woman who got along better with children than adults and was prone to pathological hoarding. It is also believed that in her convictions she was a socialist and feminist. However, since Vivian Maier never aspired to fame, did not show her work to anyone, was apparently a very secretive person and, of course, did not give any interviews, etc. almost all the information about what kind of person she was was obtained from members of the families with whom she lived and who perceived her primarily as a nanny, while not knowing either about her secret passion or about the details of her biography.
In 1959-1960. she undertook a number of travels to Egypt, Thailand, Taiwan, Vietnam, France, Italy and Indonesia. Presumably, this kind of travel was associated with the sale of a farm in France.
Working as a nanny, Vivian Maier raised three children in the Ginsburg family. With this family, she developed the warmest relationship, which continued even after all the children grew up. When she was already an elderly woman, the Ginsburgs bought her a small apartment (presumably Vivian Mayer was homeless and living on welfare at the time of the purchase). She spent the last year of her life in a nursing home, where she ended up after she slipped, fell and suffered a head injury in the winter of 2008. Vivian Maier died on April 21, 2009 at the age of 83.
After death
Shortly after Vivian Meyer's death, her photographs were sold at auction for $380 to a certain John Maloof, who worked in a real estate agency, never had much interest in photography and just wanted to acquire a few shots of Portage Park, about which he while writing an article as a freelancer.
However, studying his new acquisition, Maloof decided to find out who the author of the photographs was and soon began his investigation, revealing to the world a new photographer - Vivian Mayer.
Despite the fact that Mayer herself has never advertised her hobby and has not found any evidence that she showed her work to anyone, her archive contains more than 100,000 negatives. In addition, apparently, she was very kind to her photographs and throughout her life kept them in the best possible condition. The artist’s work has not yet been fully studied, and what is known to the general public has become such thanks to John Maloof, who is still sorting through the archive he inherited, and to collector Jeff Goldstein, who bought out some of the photographs and thereby also drew attention to Mayer’s work.
Creation
Creativity Vivian Meyer attributed to the so-called. street photography (although a variety of works can be found among her works). Most of the photographs currently published were taken between the late 1950s and early 1970s. However, this is partly due to the huge volume of images in general. In the future, John Maloof plans to release a more comprehensive publication of Meyer's work and continue to parse her archive.
It is believed that Vivian Maier has been involved in photography for almost her entire life. In addition, she managed to travel around quite a lot of countries and everywhere she took photos. It is surprising that at the same time, she always financed both photographic equipment and her travels herself, without receiving any grants, and often hiding it from her friends.
Although the main part of Vivian Mayer's archive is made up of photographs, she also engaged in video filming (mostly filming her children in charge) and recorded interviews with most likely bystanders and her own monologues on a dictaphone.
