Finding Vivian Maier

An artist's life is often one of solitude, and so it should generally be of no surprise when one spends much of their time locked away honing his or her craft. It's also not odd if one hides the work, never sharing it with others. That's more tragic. What is odd is when that person leads an otherwise social life, capturing her art in public places, never disguising the fact that she's making it. Why then hide one's light under a bushel? Or in the case of Vivian Maier, in musty garages and abandoned storage units. It's a question that is at the heart of Finding Vivian Maier, a documentary about discovering the woman's work and the difficult task of tracking down the artist responsible for thousands of unseen photographs. The story begins not with Maier, but with John Maloof, who co-directed Finding Vivian Maier with Charlie Siskel. Maloof tells about the fateful day he bought a box of negatives at an auction. While at first his onscreen presence comes off as yet another modern documentarian confusing himself with the subject, it quickly becomes obvious that the object of Maloof's search is so elusive and unknowable, and her circumstances so unique, the story of how this unfolded is just as intriguing and important as the answers Maloof uncovers. A chance Google search led Maloof to Maier's obituary, which then led to two men whom she had nannied. They had maintained Maier's storage unit up until her death, and they gave Maloof access. From there, the detective set about piecing together the narrative. He had also already begun posting Maier's photographs online, and the response had been overwhelmingly positive. Maier was a street photographer whose work spanned decades, and whose sense of style and chosen subjects put her on par with other photogs like Diane Arbus, of whom she could have been a contemporary. Finding Vivian Maier shares a good deal of these snaps--subjects range from street people to children to garbage cans and beyond--as well as reels of 8mm footage. Most of those were of children she was taking care of, and in one strange instance, a kind of investigative report where Maier retraced the steps of a murder. Here was a woman who worked so out in the open, she even interviewed people with a little tape recorder. Those who knew her knew she was up to something, so the query remains: why did she keep it all to herself?