Lubeznik Center for the Arts (LCA) will host an author talk with Pamela Bannos, biographer of world-famous photographer Vivian Maier, in tandem with its newest art exhibition, Vivian Maier: In Color, on Sunday, July 30 at 5 p.m. CDT.
Bannos is the author of the critically acclaimed book, Vivian Maier: A Photographer’s Life and Afterlife. Bannos’ richly detailed and meticulously researched study contrasts Maier’s life with the mythology that strangers have created around her absence. The myth of Maier as the “nanny savant” has eclipsed her true achievements, skills and intentions. She was not a nanny who moonlighted as a photographer; she was a photographer who supported herself as a nanny.
After her talk, Bannos will take questions and sign copies of her book, which LCA will have for sale in the LCA Gallery Shop.
Bannos is an artist and researcher who utilizes methods that highlight the forgotten and overlooked, exploring the links between visual representation, urban space, history and collective memory. Her practice splits its focus between photographic works and research projects that result in site-specific, web-based, written and audio works. She has exhibited nationally and internationally, including in solo exhibitions at the Photographers' Gallery in London, England and the Edwynn Houk Gallery in New York. She teaches at Northwestern University.
A discerning amateur photographer, Maier took thousands of pictures throughout her life, refining her craft through her explorations around Chicago, her home base from 1956 on. She died in 2009 before her life’s work was shared with the world. She left behind hundreds of prints, 100,000 negatives and about a thousand rolls of undeveloped film, which were discovered when a collector purchased the contents of her storage lockers. There is no proof she ever made a concerted effort to show her work―gifting us the mystery of an elusive woman behind the camera.
This event is sponsored by Sally K. Swanson.
For more information, please contact LCA’s marketing manager, Samantha Bean, at 219-874-4900 or sbean@lubeznikcenter.org.
