Vivian Maier: The Color Work

by Colin Westerbeck

The first definitive monograph of color photographs by American street photographer Vivian Maier.

Photographer Vivian Maier’s allure endures even though many details of her life continue to remain a mystery. Her story—the secretive nanny-photographer who became a pioneer photographer—has only been pieced together from the thousands of images she made and the handful of facts that have surfaced about her life. Vivian The Color Work is the largest and most highly curated published collection of Maier’s full-color photographs to date.

With a foreword by world-renowned photographer Joel Meyerowitz and text by curator Colin Westerbeck, this definitive volume sheds light on the nature of Maier’s color images, examining them within the context of her black-and-white work as well as the images of street photographers with whom she clearly had kinship, like Eugene Atget and Lee Friedlander. With more than 150 color photographs, most of which have never been published in book form, this collection of images deepens our understanding of Maier, as its immediacy demonstrates how keen she was to record and present her interpretation of the world around her.

Genres: Photography, Art, Nonfiction, Biography, The United States Of America, Biography Memoir, Coffee Table Books

240 pages, Kindle Edition

Published November 6, 2018

Reviews

[Dave Schaafsma · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Amazon site includes 9 images from this book by Vivian Maier, a late twentieth-century nanny and "street photographer" (and recluse) from Chicago/Evanston.

https://www.amazon.com/Vivian-Maier-C...

Maier famously left piles of her work in closets, and kept some in storage lockers, not shared with many people (if at all) in her lifetime. When the first news came of her discovered work, it was a kind of sensation, and books and documentaries have been made about her now.

With a foreword by world-renowned (also street) photographer Joel Meyerowitz and text by curator Colin Westerbeck. I have read several of the collected works and been to three or four exhibitions of her work here in Chicago. This is the first curated collection of her color work. As Meyerowitz makes clear, black and white was her main approach, since it was faster and more reliable at the time she she was working. But this color collection doesn't really disrupt her main approach to informal portraits of people. This collection generally spans the late fifties through the late seventies.

The overall effect of this collection is that it preserves a sense of everyday people in Chicago, living lives of "quiet desperation." She was herself unremarkable looking, which many have observed may have made possible her access to so many people. There's some fascinating self-portraits here, too.

[Kirsti · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've wanted to see more of Maier's color work since I saw a few color prints at the Chicago Cultural Center years ago. Now the lawsuits are settled, so her later work can finally be published. I'm delighted that this book is out but disappointed that so many images are labeled "location unknown," including ones that have easily identifiable mountains, buildings, and (in one case) a 53-foot-tall sculpture by Alexander Calder that has been in the middle of Chicago since 1974, for cry eye: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flaming...

[Jolanta (knygupė) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Spalvotoji VIvian irgi puiki.

[Alien Bookreader · Rating 4 out of 5]

Vivian Maier's photography became known only after her death, making the art stand on its own and speak for itself. The introduction to this collection of photographs describes her work as capturing "human frailty." This is what makes her photographs captivating - they're both historical documents of the United States in the 70s and a image of something timeless. Human frailty.

[Mai M Ibrahim · Rating 4 out of 5]

سمعت عن المصورة Vivian بالصدفة من كذا سنة من خلال فيلم وثائقي عنها .. من خلال مصور لاقه شرايط افلام وصور هي مصوراها للبيع ف دكان أو مخزن قديم ف من هنا بدأ يدور عليها مين دي .. محدش كان يعرفها عنها حاجه غير أنها بتشتغل جليسة اطفال الصبح وبعد كده بتصور ف الشارع .. محدش عرفها فعلا غير بعد م ماتت

الكتاب ده مجمع الصور الملونة اللي صورتها ف الشارع
الصور لطيفة والكتاب حجمه كبير جدا اتصدمت من حجمه .. الصور مطبوعة بالحجم الكبير الطبيعي اعتقد

قليل لما تلاقي الاهتمام بالصور كده ف كتب

هصور الكتاب من جوا لو حد حابب يبص عليه هنزله ع انستجرام @mai.designer92

[Stephen · Rating 2 out of 5]

Vivian Maier had a good eye. She made really strong photographs and left behind a ton of great images. I feel that a problem of her legacy however, is that she did not edit them herself and a great deal of what is being introduced to the public is frankly not that good. This collection exacerbates this problem. After reviewing this collection I felt that maybe 40% of the images were worthy of taking note and was struck by the fact that so much - easily 30% - were snapshots at best, of little interest. The remaining 30% was somewhere in between. When measured against the lifetime of negatives and slides she left behind, I'm left wondering why a better collection could not have been created -- something that would have presumably created a stronger body of work. Any photographer who put as much stock and energy into the practice as she did no doubt had strong ideas of what was and was not good and I can only guess that given the option, she would have chosen a drastically different body of photographs or made this monograph much shorter.

[Tom · Rating 5 out of 5]

What percentage of Maier's work has been scanned and document, and how much has been published? With a legacy of something like 140,000 negatives and positives and thousands of rolls of undeveloped film left behind, a mini-industry in Maier photography books, with few significant overlaps that I know of, how much more can we expect? "The Color Work" hints at far more yet to be seen or—this is unclear—has already been seen, and "The Color Work" is the result of that editing: dozens of well-composed photographs that give the impression that Maier had—if not an unfailing eye—and eye that was more often acute than night.

[Lynn · Rating 5 out of 5]

A nanny who never told people that she was photographer, her photographs, negatives and cameras were found in a storage unit that she stopped payment on after she died. The contents were auctioned off and the person who bought them found worth in them enough to develop undeveloped film, print photographs and find out who the photographer was. These are Vivian Meier’s color photographs and they’re magnificent.

[Owlseyes]

https://mymodernmet.com/vivian-maier-...

Check here too:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Jen Jones · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5. Stunning, important photography and a nice written primer on the context of her work.

[Ali Di · Rating 3 out of 5]

Vivian Maier's photography is fabulous. Your curiosity is aroused by her work, which makes you want to go out and document everyday life and bizarre things. This is a must-have for fans of her work, but I wouldn't recommend it for those who want to learn more about her.

Excerpt from the book (page 19):

"Maier worked in a variety of genres, from portraiture to architecture to landscape. A picture from 1978 that shows architecture's place in the landscape exemplifies how her intuitive genius for her medium led her to an understanding of issues then being explored in theoretical writings on photography which she was almost certainly not reading.

This view of a grand white house with its roof and front yard covered in snow has what the late critic and philosopher Roland Barthes called a punctum: the single errant detail in certain photographs that gives them their power. In this case, the punctum is the one spot of warm, yellow lamplight seen beneath the overhang of the front porch in an otherwise blue, cheerless scene.

Maier photographed this house from other points of view in other seasons, which suggests it may have been the home of the family she was working for at the time."

Book recommendations:
-Vivian Maier: A Photographer Found, 2014
-Street Photographer, 2011
-Vivian Maier Developed: The Untold Story of the Photographer Nanny, 2021

[kerrycat · Rating 4 out of 5]

don't miss Westerbeck's introduction

there are some spectacular photographs here - if you have any interest in historical street photography (especially from Chicago), this is a must.

[Raimonda | knygoms · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kalbėdama apie Vivian Maier nenoriu klijuoti tos gana intuityvios, bet beveik nieko nepasakančios klišės – „išgarsėjo po mirties.“

Iš susirinktų užuominų, paliktų pačios menininkės fotografijose ar dokumentiniame filme „Finding Vivian Maier“, matau ją kaip visišką siekio išgarsėti priešingybę.

Prisidengusią daugeliui gatvės fotografų neišvengiamu „nematomu apsiaustu“ ir apsikrovusią dėžėmis su daugiau nei 100 000 negatyvų ir pozityvų.

„I am the mystery woman“ – taip kažkada save apibūdino pati V. Maier.
„And so are your photographs“, norisi pridurti.

Jas nagrinėjantys kritikai ne tik ieško sąsajų su magiškuoju Henri Cartier-Bresson „lemiamu momentu“ (decisive moment), bet ir spekuliuoja apie pačios fotografės gyvenimą – santykius, asmenybę, įpročius.

O aš labai-labai džiaugiuosi šiuo albumu papildžiusi po truputį didėjančią mėgstamų fotografų albumų kolekciją – būtinai ieškosiu ir vieno iš juodai-baltų.

[Betsy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I recently reviewed the book Eye to Eye that was full of street photographer Vivian Meier’s black & white photos. This book is all color pictures of ordinary people doing everyday things. I loved this one too.

[Lay · Rating 5 out of 5]

Those Ektachrome colors speak the language of the soul.

[Ayşenur Bayrak · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing mysterious woman.. Her story fascinates me every time and I find myself in mere curiosity. As an analog photographer, I strive to catch the same humor, insight and perspective or even close.

[Reed · Rating 4 out of 5]

Terrific photos with some helpful background on the photographer.

[N. · Rating 4 out of 5]

My one and only bookish Christmas gift in 2018, I begged for this and I have no regrets but it is absolutely crucial to read the introductory text in order to understand what exactly it is about the images shown that makes them so special. I would have probably been disappointed by the selection if I'd skipped the text. Instead, I learned about how Vivian Maier carefully framed her images to tell a story, often zoning in on detail or showing movement in a way that one might just look at and think, "OK, it's a picture of somebody's hair," or "But, it's blurry!" I got so much out of studying the photos that I realized it influenced the way I set up my own photos when I took a quick jaunt to New Orleans, the next weekend.

Highly recommended. This book is pricey but if you're an amateur photographer who is intrigued by Vivian Maier, this book is a must. I don't have any of her black and white collections but that's next on the list. I'm hungry for more.

Note: In the text, Westerbeck acknowledges that Maier's black and white work is her best, but he does a terrific job of informing you about what makes even her lesser work important.

[P. · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love color photography and I love seeing the world in the past and through Maier's eyes, even if a lot of these are a bit blurry (I identify with that because I have a hand tremor anyway)

People just can't help SPECULATING about Maier's life via her photographs, which I think is useless and horrifying, if you were a dead person and couldn't stop people from extrapolating things from your art that you probably didn't mean.

[R · Rating 3 out of 5]

Better than some of the other books that have been published from John Maloof's collection, probably because he didn't really contribute anything here and left the writing to actual photography experts like Colin Westerbeck, whose introduction is essential to understanding and contextualizing Maier's color work. Highly annoyed at all the photos labelled as "Location Unknown" when it's pretty obvious the picture was taken in Chicago, the Calder Flamingo statue being the most obvious example.

[Adelina]

I appreciated the introduction by Colin Westerbeck a lot more than the one in Vivian Maier: Street Photographer as it actually comes from somebody knowledgeable about photography. It was also interesting to take a look into Maier's colour work as the exhibition I'd been to had a very small selection of her colour photography. After a bit more time to ponder I might even say I prefer her colour work to her black and white photography...

[Steve Angelkov · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting collection of Maier's colour photography, which outlines a deeper technical understanding of the form. Many outstanding images.

The introduction by Westerbeck and Meyerowitz provides informative commentary.

[Esther · Rating 3 out of 5]

Such an eye for detail and people. Chicago and its suburbs mostly from the 60s and 70s. The man who discovered all her thousands of negatives and slides 10 years ago after her death and brought her to the worlds attention, is from Skokie.

[Debra Schoenberger · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some of her older work, different camera. Not the best images.

[Ariste Egan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful compilation of Maier's photographs. An excellent reminder to look up from our phones and observe the world -- because art is everywhere.

[Mary Vecellio · Rating 5 out of 5]

Her work is superb. To the man that found her shit years ago in a storage unit auction and decided to share that with the world, I salute you. I know there is controversy surrounding if Vivian would have wanted her work shared with the world after her death, but I'm glad he did it anyways. I've seen the documentary on her work and have been following updates ever since because there were still so many photos not developed at that time. Reading this book and viewing her work gave me chills and it will every time. The most honest and raw photography style is definitely point-and-shoot and street photography. Seeing how people view others, viewed Vivian, and viewed someone doing something outside of the social norm made these photos even more special and unique. Her methods of composition to form exquisite selfies and images of humans being humans have made me obsessed. She has become an inspiration to me as an artist. Stay true to what I view as beautiful and worth capturing fuels my work.

My husband gave me this book for Christmas and it is a treasure of mine. I highly recommend it to any appreciator of art, and to any one wanting to study design. Vivian Maier can give great lessons on being authentic to your voice and doing your passion for you, not for the sake of fame or money.

I will add, the way they set up the book to go back and forth in time really helped capture the essence of how long she went around photographing daily. It just wowed me to realize how much time changes people and our environment.

[Nancy · Rating 3 out of 5]

In the last few weeks, I have checked out a few photography books of Vivian Maier's photos, read a biography of her life, looked at online pictures of her work and watched a documentary about how her pictures were discovered. As such, I know her street photography was outstanding, but unfortunately, this book does not showcase her best work. If this were the first example of her work I had seen I would not have become as entranced as I have become. Most of her work was done in black and white, but this book only features her color photographs, chosen and edited by others. And this is the crux of the problem, for others have selected what pictures to feature and edited them to their liking not necessarily how Ms. Maier would have chosen to do it. Plus, I thought it odd that some photos were labeled unknown locations when landmarks made it obvious as to the location or region. Of course, there were some standout pictures- the woman in the red dress on the front cover, the mother and two daughters at the Art Institute on the back cover, and my favorite of three older individuals all wearing bright yellow clothing in 1975.

[Carlos Pinto · Rating 5 out of 5]

Este libro es una joya visual, Maier tenía un ojo único. Su estilo era fascinante, con una mirada intuitiva que capta escenas cotidianas desde ángulos inesperados y poco usuales para la época en la que desarrolló la gran mayoría de su trabajo . Maier tenía un sentido del humor bastante peculiar y muchas de sus fotos fácilmente dibujan una sonrisa en mi, y su composición, logra una belleza espontánea que no se ve forzada en lo absoluto, hace ver la fotografía callejera tan fácil . Este libro demuestra que su talento no se limitaba solo al blanco y negro y es un deleite para todo amante de la fotografía callejera a color

[Jodell · Rating 4 out of 5]

When reading my last book "Burst". I learned of Vivian Maier. I saw her life was very interesting when I googled her. She was a bit odd or strange but that is what makes her so interesting. Getting ready to read her biography. This is just a few of her thousands of pics she took in her lifetime found in a storage shed and auctioned off after she died. I find some of the photo's fascinating like being a voyeur into private moments of other people's life and you catch a moment in time. She did it out of sheer passion and enthusiasm. Everyone should do what makes them happy and gives them a bit of joy regardless of if you get anything monetary out of it or not. That is not what matters.

[Vincent Eaton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Became aware of this unknown (at the time of her death) street photographer in the short BBC documentary and have been intrigued ever since. Her black and white work is more highly praised, but her color work is of a high quality as well. Her framing, her satirical bent, her eye, remain that of an incredible talent.