A morning with Vivian Maier

Ironically enough, I actually would not be aware of Vivian Maier if not for my sister-in-law’s extremely fortuitous timing. About a week before her smaller-scale exhibit disappeared from the Steven Kasher gallery, I received a lengthy email from my Pratt photography student sis singing Ms. Maier’s praises with a brief recollection of her rather unique story. Also very fortunately for me, Caroline alerted me to the closing date of the exhibit , so the two of us ventured extremely far west on a windy Saturday morning in February to see what all of the fuss was about.

Knowing this was our plan, I wanted my experience to remain completely untarnished by any other interaction with or critique of Vivian’s work, so I fought the urge to google her name and collections in the hope that the first time I interact with some of her work would be organic and in person; not through a tiny 7” netbook screen. We arrived at the gallery just mere moments after it opened its doors for the day, and already there were a surprising number of people inside that must have had the same sense of urgency as we did, with it being the last day of the exhibit. I’ll admit that upon first entering and absorbing the black and white prints around me, I had a hard time at first determining which were Vivian’s and which were of another artist on exhibition. Nearly every print in the gallery that day was a black and white photo featuring people, so you can hopefully sympathize a bit. We were politely directed to a small room in a back corner that extended its goods onto two short walls just beyond the doorway; I believe there were a modest 24-30 photos for us to examine, so my disappointment was hard to stifle. However, once I focused more on the content and not on the number, I found myself incredibly grateful that I even had this opportunity to see any in person.

The first thing that really caught my eye fortunately can be seen in the above photo of the room we were in: the series of three shots of hands behind backs.  All three were at about the same height and from about the same distance away – one was of a black man, one of a white man holding a lit cigarette, and one of a white man holding a dollar bill.  My first thought was whether other photos existed in this series that the gallery didn’t have access to, but there wasn’t much of a way of me finding out at that moment, so I pretended as if these three were the only three.  I then wondered whether Vivian (or the gallery) was trying to say something about race tensions in the 1950s and 60s – all three men are in suits, one is holding a dollar (seems almost inorganic), one holding a cigarette, and the black man feels almost modestly empty-handed compared to the other two.  I could appreciate the composition of each photo in that the focal point of each photo was centered almost perfectly on the hands, but it also made much more sense the way she chose to step away just enough to show the body of each man and a bit of his surroundings on either side of his body, almost in a rule of thirds composition.  Her use of angling also says more to me here – she is down right at eye-level with each set of hands, rather than from her original vantage point looking down, or down any lower looking up.  I had trouble not picturing each as if they were from the view of a child standing behind each man in a crowd.  You also can’t help but wonder whether these are staged, or whether she just happens to have impeccable timing.  The only other thing about these three that stood out to me was that the two white men seemed to lack any interesting use of lighting, but you can tell that the black man was photographed at a time of day where the sun was at just enough of an angle to cast a few shadows around him, almost silhouetting him or backlighting him a bit.  Was this intentional, or coincidental?

Untitled (Black Man's Hands Behind Back), ca. 1960s

Untitled (Hands Behind Back, Cigarette), ca. 1960s

Untitled (Hands Behind Back, Dollar Bill), ca. 1960s

The next grouping of thoughts that I jotted down were all observational, and unfortunately for the moment (or more importantly unfortunate because we can’t just ask Ms. Maier herself) would likely remain unanswered.  Was she asking her subjects whether she could photograph them, or was she a rogue agent, acting as Bill Cunningham does?  There seem to be many photos featuring children and older people – why? Why only two with no people? (The bus and the garbage can, which I’m still angry about) Where the hell is she standing to get that vantage point in Macy’s Parade Balloon? Why the lack of emotion in many of these?  Many of these questions could just be attributed to the limited number of prints that were part of the exhibition, and I know this sampling should not be representative of her vast collection as a whole.  But I did find it interesting that at least from this group, she didn’t seem to focus on capturing much joyous emotion beyond Boy With Ball and Man Behind Curved Back.  Some fear (Marquee, “Master of Horror”), some concern (Woman with Veiled Hat), some curiosity (Three Elderly Women Staring), some despair (Man Lying on Grate), but no real happiness that I noticed.  Just a sea of straight faces.  Most disturbingly, the woman in the ticket booth of this next one.  Take a close look. Had I known of this image at the start of class, it likely would have become one of the five photos that I ‘hate’ or that piss me off.  Beautifully composed, extremely interesting due to the action and the lighting of the marquee, but so impersonal, cold and almost inhumane, just from that bitch in the booth. Sheesh.

Untitled (Marquee with Man on Stretcher), ca. 1960s

Another series that struck me (and likely most of the viewers) was the four self portraits that hung together inside the tiny room.  Just from what very little I did learn about Vivian prior to the exhibit (though mainly from the book cover), I know that she did take self-portraits here and there, and they were not always just her shadow/silhouette.  However, these four in particular were very interesting to me, especially in noticing my own reaction to them and how I found myself very attracted to one and extremely opposed to another.  In Shadow and Kite and Shadow On Wood, she seemed very careful to choose an angle of lighting that not only cast the best possible shadow of herself, but also composed each of these two in such a perfect way that you could not tell at all that she was holding a camera.  For all we knew at first glance, these are photos of a random shadow and not that of our photographer. I then found myself truly hating Car Window Reflection with Leaf, and I still find myself wondering whether I genuinely dislike its eerie composition and cold, impersonal feeling given the absence of any direct light, or whether the hipster in me just likes to be argumentative because this is clearly one that everyone else is in love with.  I’ll blame the leaf – it’s really throwing me off.  On the other side, I found myself really enjoying Window, Mirror Reflection.  For not being in a digital age where you can click, examine, and click again if need be, this shot is pretty ingenious.  We catch a glimpse of the camera in the mirror reflection, but I actually like that it serves as a very clear identifier of ‘this is the photographer and here is her tool and her face’, rather than the creepy, anonymous shadows of the other three.  We also see some amazing composition that must have taken a moment to plan – a blurry lamp in the foreground, the window reflection a bit clearer and taking up much of the space in the photo, but then is interrupted by a striking sharp chard of broken mirror right inside of the window reflection that shows us a smaller, clearer and stoic version of Vivian.  This feels like it follows the rule of the ‘golden triangle’ – your eye could bounce between the lamp, the window reflection and down to the mirror chard, only to be drawn right back up to the lamp yet again, imposing the cycle endlessly.

Self-Portrait (Window, Mirror Reflection), ca. 1960s

There are three other photos that I wanted to discuss individually because each had something in it that really struck me as far as 2-D techniques goes.  The first is her use of angles and framing in Woman and Baby with Flags.

Untitled (Woman and Baby with Flags), 1960s

She chose to frame the woman and baby with planters and flags, but didn’t give a finite bottom to the shot.  It also almost feels a bit creepy as if she’s watching them from this lower angle without them even knowing it, but she was able to capture a real moment of this woman holding this baby somewhat emotionless and detached, almost as if it were a sack of potatoes.  I also wondered why she chose not to move just slightly to her right and frame all of the woman’s face, rather than cutting her head off a bit with the flag stick.  The next is of the couple with the dog.

Untitled (Interior, Couple with Dog), ca. 1960s

I found the lighting in this shot particularly striking.  The source is obvious – it’s more or less pouring in from a window in the next room, but the way it reflects off the floor, casting a shadow off the man, almost washing away the woman’s feet, and only partially illuminating one side of one of the suitcases became very interesting for one’s eye to bounce around the image with several focal points.  I might be alone, but after examining how the light interacts with each piece of the photo, I found myself ending in the same place each time: the dog. The light interacts with each other object, whispers only a bit in the top right window, and screams its way in from the door on the left, and everything seems to be affected by it.  Everything but the dog, that is.  And for whatever reason, that highlights the dog more than anything else for me.  Pretty interesting technique, I’d say.  Finally, the use of thirds with the three generations.

Untitled (Three Generations, Boy Looking Forward), ca. 1960s

Quite frankly, this photo drove me up a wall.  Stepping back a bit though for a moment, the composition is very interesting in that all three subjects have darker clothing on, making the contrast between them and the light in the top very stark.  We also do have what I saw as a rule of thirds, though the center third of the boy is not even with the outer thirds of the men (thus not a perfect rule of thirds, but bare with me here).  The triangle that the eye travels around in the differing heights between the men was also done well – we go from the tallest man on the right down to the lowest point, the boy (though only slightly lower), then up again to almost as high as the first man with the third man.  Then the line extending at an angle from his head leads us across the photo from left to right and back up to the first man’s head, starting the cycle over again.  Pretty impressed with that composition and technique.  Finally, my major issue – the men have their backs to us, the boy is turning to look at her.  Was this staged? Why do it like this? Framing the boy like that with the other two men is very interesting and likely speaks to some kind of relationship between the three, but why have him turn around? Did she yell “hey kid” and the other two ignored?  It almost feels contrived.

In a nutshell, I couldn’t be happier that Caroline and I were able to have the opportunity to visit this exhibit while it was still there.  It’s a shame that Vivian Maier chose to function as she did and we’re only just learning of her work decades later without being able to ask her any questions, but I’m grateful that both my sister in law and this exhibition have gotten me started.  I’m sure Vivian and I will be spending much more time together in the future.  Lastly, for anyone who is interested, here is a link to the video that my sister sent me – definitely worth a peek: http://www.wimp.com/photographernanny/. I also recommend setting aside some time to absorb as much from her website as you can – http://www.vivianmaier.com/.