Here is a try at a more balanced judgement: what we have here is a collective work of art, like jazz or theater. Ms. Maier played the Rolleiflex; some unknown professional played the enlarger (and man, is he good with it); and John Maloof told the story, and he has a hell of a talent at marketing it.
Vivian Maier was not really an artist, I think, but it is hard not to respond to her personal story. She tried to live according to her own rules when young, and was lonely in her old age, like we all are likely to be in this modern world of ours. And what was the deal with her photo-snapping obsession? I hear that she recorded conversations, later made 8mm movies, and kept mountains of old newspapers. One can only make up his own interpretation. To me, it sounds as though she feared impermanence, and tryed to stop the passing of time.
It is not an uncommon sentiment. Japanese culture seems to be more aware of it than most: there is an entire cycle of seasonal occupations, that deal with the enjoyment of transitory beauty, cherry blossoms being the most famous. With the cherry blossoms, I hear that the most beautiful moment is the consider the one in which the petals come off the trees like a snowfall. It takes a lot of control at that point not to give in to the sadness for the end of the flowers (which, of course, foreshadows our own demise). Maybe Vivian felt this form of mono no aware acutely, and tried to cure it with her camera.
It did not work for the people she pictured, who have become anonymous, like characters in a morality play: the Old Lady, the Policeman, the Couple on the Beach, the Bum. They, too, by now, must be sleeping the Big Sleep, as gone as Villon's last year's snow.
No comments:
Post a Comment