Inspired

I think I’ve mentioned before how I’m not all that into art so much.  Drawings, paintings, that kind of stuff.  I appreciate them, enjoy seeing them, but mostly the stuff that I like to look at has to BE something.  I’m not a fan of the pain splatters strewn across a canvas that someone tells me is the artist’s symbolic struggle with the evils of mankind.  I just don’t get it.

But I find that I can stare at a single photograph for endless amounts of time.  Imagining what was happening in just that moment.  Or how the photographer was able to capture something so brilliant.  There are endless amounts of photographers out there who are simply, breathtakingly, inspiring.  Some of them are professionals who earn their living taking photos, but many of them recreational.  Like the 7th grader who uses her parents’ camera or the 20 year old who moved to a beautiful place and wanted to capture that beauty on film.

My favorite right now is Vivian Maier.  She was a nanny & housekeeper who seemed to have always had her Rolleiflex TLR with her.  She never showed anyone her pictures and it would seem that many of her rolls of film she didn’t even get processed.  Mostly street scenes in Chicago in the 1950s through the 70s there are also many portraits as well.  Usually I gravitate to the black and whites, but the above image is one of the only color photos I’ve seen so far.

I can’t really express why I love this photo so much.  The dress, the color … I wonder what she’s waiting for.  Is anxious?  Excited?

And we’ll never know, but isn’t that what makes it so fascinating?
*photo from http://vivianmaier.blogspot.com/