Finding Vivian Maier goes for Oscar

Vivian Maier/Maloof Collection, courtesy Howard Greenberg Gallery, New York

A documentary about the nanny and unknown photographer "Finding Vivian Maier" will be up for an Oscar for Best Documentary Feature on Sunday night at the Academy Awards.

Vivian Maier worked as a nanny for 40 years, mostly in Chicago's North Shore. She took more than 150,000 photos primarily of people and architecture in Chicago, New York and Los Angeles, all unseen during her lifetime. She died at the age of 83 alone in a nursing home in 2009.

John Maloof, a Chicago historian and art collector acquired boxes of her prints and negatives at a local thrift auction house during a sale of her possessions on Chicago's Northwest Side in 2007 to recoup her debts. Two others, Ron Slattery and Randy Prow also found some of her work. In 2009 after keeping the negatives and prints in storage for two years, Maloof shared some her images on Flickr and the interest in the previously unknown photographer went viral. Critical acclaim in the fine art and photojournalism worlds followed and her work is widely exhibited.

The interest in the mystery of Vivian Maier culminated in the film. Maier has come to be considered one of the 20th century's greatest street photographers.

More info:

Howard Greenberg Gallery

VivianMaier.com

FindingVivianMaier.com

Finding Vivian Maier

Untitled, March 1954

Photograph by Vivian Maier

Finding Vivian Maier

New York, New York, date unknown

Photograph by Vivian Maier

Finding Vivian Maier

Self-portrait, date unknown

Maier took many self-portraits throughout her photography career. Most show her in a somewhat mysterious, obscured way. Since her work has been discovered she's often been described as eccentric and an enigma.

Photograph by Vivian Maier