Vivian Maier: Out of the Shadows

Vivian Maier exhibit
A visitor views a contact sheet of images at the "Vivian Maier: Out of the Shadows" photo exhibit at the Minneapolis Photo Center in Minneapolis, Minn. Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2014.
Jeffrey Thompson/MPR News

The Minneapolis Photo Center can be a hard place to find amid the warehouses of north Minneapolis that in recent years have gained a second life. The location, inside the Northwind Warehouse lofts building, almost seems secret. But that's fitting for the center's current exhibit, "Vivian Maier: Out of the Shadows."

By the time she died, Maier had taken more than 120,000 photographs, mostly in black and white of 1950s and '60s Chicago, mostly with a popular camera at the time that would mystify modern Instragrammers and selfie fans. Her twin-lens reflex Rollieflex held at waist level required its user to look down into the camera and frame her subjects while looking at them in reverse.

What makes Maier's biography so compelling is that she rarely showed her photos to anyone. It was only when a storage locker was sold to pay her debts that the extent -- and quality -- of her work came to light. An exhibition of some of her work, "Vivian Maier: Out of the Shadows" is on display at the Mpls Photo Center through March 1. The organization's Sydnee Beckett spoke about the exhibit with The Daily Circuit.

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