Vivian Maier: lost art of an urban photographer – On BBC One Tonight – June 25, 2013
I am a massive fan of Vivian Maier’s work and as the BBC point out, ‘She’s been called ‘the greatest photographer you’ve never heard of’… the mysterious Vivian Maier, a nanny based in Chicago who took about 150,000 photographs in her lifetime and stashed them away, not showing them to anyone.
She left thousands not even developed, and most as negatives from which she never made prints.
It was sheer accident that her life’s work was discovered.
Two years before she died in 2009, Vivian Maier stopped paying the rent on five storage lockers in Chicago. Without her knowledge the contents were sold.
At locker sales, you have to stand at the door and buy without touching. So auctioneer Roger Gunderson saw only a jumble of boxes and suitcases:
“A Paris sticker on one trunk caught my eye. I thought maybe there’s going to be some perfume or jewellery.”
Gunderson bought the lot for $250 – “a truck and a half load of stuff”, he says: papers, magazines and thousands upon thousands of photographs.
People who then bought them at auction posted a few online. Before long, Vivian Maier went viral. Now her prints sell for thousands of dollars/pounds a piece’.
Tonight on BBC One at 10.35 pm (BST) you can see the latest documentary of life. It will also be available to catch up later on BBC iPlayer (if you don’t have this app, you must download it – click here).
Joanne Carter
Joanne Carter is a British photography journalist, editor, curator, and the founder of *TheAppWhisperer.com*, one of the world’s leading platforms dedicated to mobile photography and art. Since its launch in 2009, TheAppWhisperer has become an international hub for artists of all levels to discover, learn, exhibit, and engage with contemporary photographic practice.Built on principles of inclusivity, accessibility, and artistic excellence, Joanne has spent almost two decades championing mobile photography as a serious artistic medium. Through interviews, critical essays, exhibitions, competitions, and education, she has helped shape and document the evolution of mobile art on a global scale.Her work has taken her internationally, lecturing on photography and mobile art at institutions and events including the Museum of Art in Seoul, South Korea, alongside appearances in the UK and Europe. She has served as a juror for international photography and mobile art awards across Portugal, Canada, the United States, South Korea, Italy, and the UK.Joanne is also the founder of *TheAppWhispererPrintSales.com*, one of the first online galleries dedicated exclusively to collectible mobile art, connecting artists with collectors across Europe, the United States, and Asia.Before founding TheAppWhisperer, Joanne worked extensively in print journalism and photographic publishing, including roles at a paparazzi photo agency and as deputy editor of a leading photography magazine. Her freelance journalism, criticism, and commentary have been published widely in both the UK and the US, with bylines in *The Times*, *The Sunday Times*, *The Guardian*, *Popular Photography*, *NikonPro*, *DPReview*, *Which?*, *Vogue Italia*, *LensCulture*, the *BBC*, and more recently, the *Financial Times*, where her published letters on photography continue to contribute to wider conversations around the medium.Alongside her editorial and curatorial work, Joanne’s own photographic practice has been exhibited internationally across the UK, Europe, South Korea, and the United States. Her work increasingly explores themes of grief, loss, death, memory, and the body.Her current research interests centre on grief, death, and poverty, with forthcoming postgraduate study leading towards doctoral research in these areas.Joanne is currently developing new long-form writing and photographic projects and is available for commissions, editorial projects, speaking engagements, and collaborations.Contact: joannetheappwhisperer@gmail.com)
6 Comments
Carlos
Wonder what Vivian would thought of all this attention. Hope we can watch the show here in USA. Will try downloading the app.
Laurence Zankowski
Joanne,
This work along with a few other outside artists from that era, where embarked on learning a visual language that came from deep intuitive explorations.
Vivian fits right into what Scorsese has been saying lately about watching the old films. There was no language and these folks were discovering aspects of an ancient symbology with their work and subsequent exhibiting of it.
They were unfettered by main stream group mentatlity. We need less snapping of images and more thought into why.
Be well
Laurence
Janine Graf
She was truly brilliant, wasn’t she? [wipes tear from eye]
gina costa
I know the guys who bought the storage locker of her films/etc. What a story!
Tracy Mitchell Griggs
The good news is that the work was salvaged. The sad thing, is that a woman artist’s lifetime of work, was almost lost to history. I am happy that a docu crew made a film and can’t wait to see it.
Lee Thatcher
This program was so good. I was lucky enough to get to the exhibition in Chicago, such inspiring work.