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Now I have seen Vivian Maier: Street Photographer edited by John Maloof, who purchased one of the auctioned blocks in 2007. In this book, after a very brief introduction by critic Geoff Dyer, he lets the photos speak for themselves. This is a smaller but more focused collection of images than the previously reviewed book. Here each photograph gets a full page. Someone not knowing her story would assume on viewing this collection that Maier was a renowned Life or Look photojournalist of the 1950s and 1960 instead of an unknown nanny who took photos on her day off.
Being a nanny did not make Maier sweet in any way. She strolled rough streets in New York and Chicago documenting drunks, panhandlers, weary commuters, and police against a backdrop of decay and ruin. Though the scenes are sometimes stark and I doubt some of the subjects were aware of Maier's photographing them, Maier is respectful. She was even whimsical in the series of self-portraits, which may be found at the back of the book.
If you reserved the Vivian Maier book by Cahan and Williams, order this one, too.
Maier, Vivian. Vivian Maier: Street Photographer. PowerHouse Books, 2011. 123p. ISBN 9781576875773
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