[HN Gopher] What Vivian Maier saw in color (2018)
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       What Vivian Maier saw in color (2018)
        
       Author : oxonia
       Score  : 43 points
       Date   : 2025-03-03 07:00 UTC (2 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.newyorker.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.newyorker.com)
        
       | oxonia wrote:
       | https://archive.is/MHzBO
        
       | drcongo wrote:
       | Thanks for this. For anyone interested there's a fantastic
       | documentary about her called Finding Vivian Maier -
       | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finding_Vivian_Maier
        
         | copypasterepeat wrote:
         | Agreed. It's also free to stream.
         | 
         | I've seen it a couple of times and I keep marveling at the
         | sheer strangeness of how it all played out.
        
       | shishy wrote:
       | The interesting part of her work is that unlike other
       | photographers who not only took photos but had the chance to edit
       | them, someone else discovered a bunch of negatives she left
       | behind. So others came in later to turn them into what you see.
       | 
       | Anyone who has shot photos (film or digital) knows how much
       | effort goes into the editing process.
       | 
       | I love her photographs and her story, I just find it fascinating
       | to think about this detail, especially when contextualizing her
       | with other artists.
        
         | thih9 wrote:
         | The fact that she did no editing makes her photos more
         | impressive in a lot of ways.
         | 
         | At the same time there were other photographers with that
         | approach, who left processing to others and/or opted for no
         | editing; e.g.:
         | 
         | > He believed in composing his photographs in the viewfinder,
         | not in the darkroom. He showcased this belief by having nearly
         | all his photographs printed only at full-frame and completely
         | free of any cropping or other darkroom manipulation. He
         | insisted that his prints be left uncropped so as to include a
         | few millimeters of the unexposed negative around the image
         | area, resulting in a black frame around the developed picture.
         | 
         | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henri_Cartier-Bresson
        
           | shishy wrote:
           | Yep. It was a little shocking when I learned that about HCB a
           | while ago. Totally agree.
        
         | miramba wrote:
         | ...and she will never know how famous she became! Here is a
         | true artist, one that never seeked to be appreciated as one.
         | I'm such a fan.
        
       | NaOH wrote:
       | Previous discussion:
       | 
       |  _What Vivian Maier saw in color (2018)_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19498483 - March 2019 (17
       | comments)
        
       | MrMcCall wrote:
       | Great article.
       | 
       | The article also mentions another artist who led a remarkable
       | life:
       | 
       | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Darger
       | 
       | He wrote, over 60 years, a 15,145 page illustrated fantasy novel,
       | as a janitor who had had a very, very difficult life. At first, I
       | initially couldn't process that figure and automatically read it
       | as 15,000 _words_ , but, NO!, it's 15,145 _pages_. Unbelievable.
       | 
       | I had never before heard of either of these extraordinary
       | artists, but my day is already better for having learned of their
       | lives and works.
        
       | black_puppydog wrote:
       | The story of Maier is also re-told in a beautiful tome by a
       | French artist:
       | 
       | Not knowing about who Maier was, I picked this up at a local book
       | fair because of the way the compositions in the panels reminded
       | me of photography. Only by talking to the author at the fair did
       | I realize that she told the story of some of Maier's best known
       | photographs, and that's why it looked the way.
       | 
       | Anyhow, if you speak french, I wholeheartedly recommend it:
       | 
       | https://peinture-fraiche.be/en/book/vivian-maier-a-la-surfac...
        
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       (page generated 2025-03-05 23:02 UTC)