How Charles Simic Might Approach Vivian Maier's Photography
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Submitted By Words 1015 Pages 5
Cheyne Brown
Rachel Stevens
Writing 121
7 October 2014
How Charles Simic Might Approach Vivian Maier’s Photography
Imagine a black and white photograph overlooking a New York City street circa 1953. The Chrysler Building dominating the background skyline, you notice a group of commuters waiting on an El train platform looking down below as people congregate near shops and restaurants lining the street in the foreground. This might be an adequate insight into a Vivian Maier photograph. Although accurate, the description feels lifeless, and lacks the amazing nostalgic detail Poet Laureate Charles Simic might put on it. Simic, the author of the essay “The Life of Images” might ask himself questions like: “Where are the commuters going? What is the group of women doing by the hardware and appliance store?” Maybe Simic has eaten at Joe’s Restaurant (large signage in Maier’s photograph), and that brings back a flood of memories. It wouldn’t take him long to weave a detailed story about what these people in the photo were doing, or even conversations they might be having. Simic writes, “A photograph…, where time has stopped on an ordinary scene full of innuendoes, partakes of the infinite” (576). I feel Simic would approach Maier’s photographs the same way he approached Berenice Abbott’s photos, referenced in “The Life of Images”, breathing life and imagination into them.
First I should give you a little background on who these three people are. Charles Simic is a writer, most notably as a poet winning a Pulitzer Prize in poetry and earning an appointment as the U.S. poet laureate in 2007. Born in 1938, he immigrated with his family to the United States from Belgrade, Yugoslavia (now Serbia). Growing up in war-torn Europe helped shape his unique perspective (Simic, Charles). In “The Life of Images” Simic writes, “Being one of the millions of displaced persons made an impression on me. In addition to my own little story of bad luck, I heard plenty of others” (575). I think this perspective gives him the ability to draw, not only from his own memories, but also from the experiences of others. Having a larger pool of these experiences allows Simic the ability to create a rich and detailed backstory to a photograph.
The photographer Simic seems to admire a great deal, and references in his essay is Berenice Abbott. Born in Ohio in 1898 she briefly spent time in New York City to study sculpture. From there she moved to France in the 1920’s and taught herself photography. Later she became a well-known portrait photographer having her own studio before moving back to New York in 1929, where she continued taking photographs. Abbott is best known for her black and white photos of the rapidly changing cityscape of New York City after the roaring 20’s. (Berenice Abbott Biography).
In contrast to Abbott, Vivian Maier was not known or published as a photographer/artist while she was alive. Maier’s interesting story began in 1926. Born in New York she spent most of her childhood in France, before returning to the U.S. in 1951 and made her living as a nanny. Throughout her travels she snapped photos of people and cityscapes of France, Chicago and New York. Consistently taking photographs for over five decades left her with thousands of undeveloped negatives that she kept in a storage unit. When she passed away in 2009, the locker went up for auction, and purchased by John Maloof. Shortly after, Maloof slowly introduced Maier’s photography to the internet, and it began to draw interest (About Vivian Maier). What draws people to her photographs is the rawness to them. They weren’t cropped, manipulated or captioned to show you what she wanted you to see. They weren’t captured for consumption, but show a snapshot of things she found worthy of capture.
Without having a keen eye for photography, I feel comfortable stating the works of Abbott and Maier are extremely similar in both composition and subject matter. Both working in a black and white medium format, and taking extremely detailed photographs of the city streets and the people inhabiting them. Both being a perfect catalyst for Simic’s storytelling. About Abbott’s photo “Blossom Restaurant” Simic writes, “You could put me in solitary with Abbott’s photograph of ‘Blossom Restaurant’, and I wouldn’t notice the month’s pass away as I studied the menu chalked on the blackboard at its entrance”(578). Imagine a black and white photograph of shop windows. A restaurant’s windows filled with writings of menu offerings and prices, with a stairwell leading down under the city to a barber shop. A seemingly ordinary photo to most, it launches Simic into a detailed story of lunches he used to eat, images of an old electric head massager they used to have in barber shops, and the worst haircut he ever had. “The enigma of the ordinary – that’s what makes old photographs so poignant” (Simic 580). Simic’s anecdotes wonderfully demonstrate his ability to transport himself into the past.
Simic’s approach towards photographs leans heavily toward the nostalgic and abstract. He tends to draw his context from memories, impressions, and assumptions. Transporting himself to another place and time, creating his own reality of a photograph. “Can one experience nostalgia for a time and place one did not know?” (Simic 578) The answer being yes, he can and he does. I think Maier’s photos, without any caption, or clear narrative were made for an eye like Simic’s. Her photos begging for an imagination to create a story about them, and bring them to life. Charles Simic would approach Vivian Maier’s photography the same way he approaches other old photographs of New York City – with a deep sense of connection and sentimentality.
Works Cited
Simic, Charles. “The Life of Images.” The Writer’s Presence: A Pool of Readings, 7th ed. Ed. Donald McQuade and Robert Atwan. Boston: Bedford/St.Martin’s 2012. 575-580. Print.
