Almost Lost 1950-60s Street Photos Of NYC And Chicago By Vivian Maier

In 2007, historian and collector John Maloof found a box with thousands of black and white photography and film negatives by Vivian Dorothea Maier. Only in 2011, two years after Maier’s death, was her forgotten talent acknowledged by the public, as her works started travelling through exhibitions in the U.S. and Europe and a book of her photography works was published.

Born in New York City, the photographer spent a portion of her life living in France and later returned to the U.S., were she worked as a nanny for forty years. Although she traveled and photographed many places worldwide, most of of her newly-found vast collection of photographs focuses on Chicago and New York City life in the 1950s and 1960s.

Maier’s photography was a secret passion she hid even from her closest friends. She was described as an open-minded person with socialistic and feministic points of view and an honest personality. This is evident in her photography, which often focuses on the poor and less fortunate. It seems that she always managed to get to the right place at the right moment to capture the power and raw beauty of mid-century American city life.

Source: vivianmaier.com (via: mymodernmet)

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