Reflection of Self

Vivian Maier (February 1, 1926 – April 21, 2009) was an American street photographer born in New York City. Although born in the U.S., it was in France that Maier spent most of her youth. Maier returned to the U.S. in 1951 where she took up work as a nanny and care-giver for the rest of her life. In her leisure however, Maier ventured into the art of photography. Consistently taking photos over the course of five decades, she ultimately left over 100,000 negatives, most of them shot in Chicago and New York City. Vivian further indulged in her passionate devotion to documenting the world around her through homemade films, recordings and collections, assembling one of the most fascinating windows into American life in the second half of the twentieth century.

Maier’s secret body of work came to light in 2007 when a locker containing a massive hoard of her negatives was discovered at a local thrift auction house on Chicago’s Northwest Side. 

Renowned for her work capturing the spontaneity of street scenes, Vivian Maier was also an avid self-portraitist. She quite literally reflected herself in many of her works. Was she pioneering the modern-day "Selfie"?