Jump to content

"Finding Vivian Maier"


Recommended Posts

I was quite fortunate to find this documentary film on Netflix. The film's creation and production itself is an interesting story ( use this link to read an account on IMDB - Finding Vivian Maier (2013) - IMDb .) A real estate agent looking for old photographs to buttress his business bought a container of old photos at an auction and subsequently found out that Vivian Maier had taken them. After researching her life and her interest in photography (primarily street), he felt compelled to learn photography.

 

The upshot of this thread is that people are initially drawn to photography for different reasons.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Michael, if you do a search for Maier in the No Words search box you’ll find several interesting threads about her and this film over the years. Ultimately, I pretty much feel at this point that her story and the story of the filmmaker and the various controversies and myths surrounding her and her negatives is perhaps more interesting than the photos themselves. Edited by Norma Desmond
We didn't need dialogue. We had faces!
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Michael, if you do a search for Maier in the No Words search box you’ll find several interesting threads about her and this film over the years. Ultimately, I pretty much feel at this point that her story and the story of the filmmaker and the various controversies and myths surrounding her and her negatives is perhaps more interesting than the photos themselves.

 

Thanks, Fred. I'll look for those threads. Make 2018 spectacular.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Her pictures are really good, I have the book of them. But I think now, without support from major galleries, interest start fading away.

 

I think if she was shooting in this era, she would just be another serious amateur photographer and could have been one of the many folks here on Photo.net or other sites, as for the quality and style of street shooting. She did get good, part of the charm is viewing this multitude of shots from the past.

 

So many here on PN do this hobby too. Is she more special than other photographers who have lived and alive today? The work is of the value we give it. How many great photos that exist today, might be lost to thrown away hard drives in 100 years.

 

Will someone in 70 years pay $5 at an auction for a box of used hard drives full of photos from our era and print them and put them on display in a public gallery? lol

 

We have discovered photos from Mark Keefer, this odd character who carried a camera with him everywhere and took photos of everything. lol or they discover any one of your old hard drives, just making a point.

  • Like 1
Cheers, Mark
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think if she was shooting in this era, she would just be another serious amateur photographer and could have been one of the many folks here on Photo.net or other sites, as for the quality and style of street shooting. She did get good, part of the charm is viewing this multitude of shots from the past.

 

So many here on PN do this hobby too. Is she more special than other photographers who have lived and alive today? The work is of the value we give it. How many great photos that exist today, might be lost to thrown away hard drives in 100 years.

 

Will someone in 70 years pay $5 at an auction for a box of used hard drives full of photos from our era and print them and put them on display in a public gallery? lol

 

We have discovered photos from Mark Keefer, this odd character who carried a camera with him everywhere and took photos of everything. lol or they discover any one of your old hard drives, just making a point.

 

Just about everybody carries a camera with them today, and lots of people publish photos daily via instagram, facebook, flickr, snapchat, and others. It's quite a different situation from Maier's time. Now, the majority of this pictures are of the photographers themselves, friends, or family, -- not strangers but I'm guessing there are plenty of those too.

 

It's hard to imagine another Maier coming out of this age for a lot of reasons. One is that a box of negatives is far more likely to survive 70 years intact than a box of hard drives. A digital image's survival will require more active and periodic intervention.

Edited by tomspielman
  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's hard to imagine another Maier coming out of this age for a lot of reasons. One is that a box of negatives is far more likely to survive 70 years intact than a box of hard drives. A digital image's survival will require more active and periodic intervention.

 

I'm willing to bet my Nikon F2A will still be working in 70 years. Too bad I won't be around to collect LOL.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...