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| Vivian Maier, January 26, 1955, Up town New York, NY |
In class we have viewed and discussed
the history of photographic processes as well as different genres of
photography like photojournalism. Photography from the start has
fascinated and excited the masses, and as such has always had a
following of hobbyist practitioners. Not all great photographs and
photographers are employed by the government, magazines, corporations
or are artists. The greatest body of work in photography lies in the
private sector. One genre of photography that lies outside what we
have looked at this semester and speaks directly to the private
sector is street photography. Its core and function is similar in
nature to documentary photography, but street photography seeks to
capture moments of everyday life. Unlike documentary photography, street photography is not concerned with capturing a story, it is
about one particular moment. The contemporary group, Street
Photographers, defines their work as “capture[ing] un-posed
moments, interpreting life around them and challenging our
perceptions of the world.”1
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| Vivian Maier, Christmas Eve of 1953, 78th St. & 3rd Ave, New York, NY |
Street photography differs from other
forms of photography because it is concerned with capturing everyday
life in candid moments. And unlike other genres of photography like
documentary photography or photojournalism, street photography is
mainly executed by amateur photographers. The beginning of street
photography movement in the United States is thought to have begun in
the 1930s.2 The portable camera also caused
the popularity of street photography to rise. Cameras were able to
travel and many amateur hobbyists took up the camera and hit the
streets. Urban centers, particularity New York
City, have been and still are popular backdrops for street
photographers. The hustle and bustle of city life provides a vast
array of the subject matter and subjects.
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| Vivian Maier, May 5, 1955, New York, NY |
Often in class, we have discussed how
photographs take a backseat to text based documents in archives and
museums collections. The tide is turning on this front and with the
acceptance of photographs as evidential documents and as an art
form, the photograph is gaining immense appeal and importance. The
rise in appreciation and use of visual materials and the large scale
of digitization of images only helps increase the importance of
photography collections. Photographs, especially street photography,
will prove to be important evidence of bygone eras. The everyday
styles, fashions, and conditions are locked in the images, and if not
collected and preserved they will be lost. The collecting and
preservation of these types of collections is inherently much harder,
and endangers street photography more than other types of photography
executed by magazines, newspapers, and the government. These unique
collections are not easily found, but have great value when found.
 |
| Vivian Maier, Self Portrait, 1959. |
A great example of a street
photographer's collection being saved from oblivion is the story of
Vivian Maier. Maier is a recently discovered street photographer. She
was a private citizen who worked as a nanny, and in her free time
took photos of everyday life in New York City and later Chicago. Her
work was discovered at an auction when her belongings were put up for
sale after the payments on her storage unit became delinquent. A man,
John Maloof, purchased one plastic tub of negatives. In that tub he
found a treasure trove of work. Maloof was so impressed by what he
saw that he sought out the rest of the containers of negatives from
the other buyers. He has been able to amass much of her life work and
he estimates he has 100,000 negatives. His find was a stroke of
luck, but also goes to show that there is an impressive body of work
that still lays outside the walls of museums and archives. Maloof,
since 2007, has been made it his personal mission to bring her work
to the public. In addition to digitizing the collection, he has
sought out and interviewed the former employers of Maier in an
attempt to learn about her life. Maloof is also trying to find a
repository for the collection. Maier's work is incredibility striking
and covers over 40 years of urban life. (A video on the discovery of Maier's work: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWEDOnBfDUI) She is an excellent example
of the amateur street photographer and hopefully her collection will
one day find a permanent home.
As future archivists, we are challenged
not only to protect our collections but also to contextualize the
collections. Our jobs put us in the unique position of being able to
save invaluable materials through the appraisal and collecting
process. We understand the importance of visual images and how they
can be important and vital research materials, but we also have to
choose to look beyond the boundaries of traditionally acceptable
materials. Special collections, Historical Societies, and
repositories large and small all have the ability to seek out subject
specific materials and could target private photograph collections
that match the mission of their institutions and help save amazing
images like those of Vivian Maier.
2
Westerbeck, Colin and Joel Meyerowitz. Bystander: A History of
Street Photography (Boston: Little and Brown, 1996) 253-257.
Sources:
Vivian Maier -
http://www.vivianmaier.com/
Video on Maier:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWEDOnBfDUI
Westerbeck, Colin and Joel Meyerowitz.
Bystander: A History of Street Photography. Boston: Little and
Brown, 1996.
Street Photographers -
http://www.street-photographers.com/
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