(Credits: Far Out / National Museum of Science and Media / IFC Films)
If you were to ask people about Joan Fontcuberta, the name wouldn’t perk half as many ears as the name Vivian Maier. That’s why this story, and the art world, is so bizarre and confusing. Fontcuberta was a Spanish photographer who rose to prominence in the late 1980s. To look at his photos is like experiencing the worst trip of your life. Uncanny, unnerving and sinister don’t quite cover it. Take his series Stranger Than Fiction, for example, which includes an image of a long snake with feet or a snow fox with no tail and a turtle’s face for a head.
If an alien landed on Earth and saw these images, they would fully believe such creatures exist on our planet. The images have been so carefully manipulated that only humans know they aren’t real. Fontcuberta’s photography tries to challenge what we perceive as real and fake to a point where the lines blur, and we no longer know the difference.
Trying to find a connection between Fontcuberta and Vivian Maier is like trying to find a needle in a haystack: it’s impossible to find. Yet Fontcuberta spent his life talking about how it was thanks to him that Maier became the photographer she is known as today.
“Eh… Vivian Maier…Well, I have to make a confession, Vivian Maier, I created her, I created her but through techniques that are very easy to explain: First, the fortuitous discovery […] in the middle of all that vulgarity there is a treasure, glittering gold. And that was the case for Vivien Maier.” said Fontcuberta at the Biennale Di Fotografia di Bologna in November 2017.
Maier’s name today is associated with her work and identity as a photographer, but whilst she was alive, she was an unknown nanny working in Chicago in the ‘50s. She only started doing photography in her free time, documenting casual everyday moments in urban America.
Her story is fascinating; a lowly nanny develops a remarkable skill for photography, but hides it from the public, until 100,000 negatives are randomly discovered after her death.
“We set up a small business, a small business that consists of selling the Vivian Maier brand as an author of street photography, as a revelation, as someone who has been underground, that we had to dress it up with an interesting story,” claimed Fontcuberta.
But can we trust him? So many believe that this is just Fontcuberta playing a big mental manipulation game yet again, just like in his photography. By continuing to reinforce the false narrative that he invented Vivian Maier, we might all eventually believe him. In fact, even ChatGPT doesn’t believe him. A simple search shows that “they have no direct connection in terms of their work or personal lives”.
Thus, Fontcuberta’s invention of Maier might embody his most astounding piece of work, proving that authors, fame and ultimately truth can be entirely fabricated with enough determination and good marketing.
When you think about it, this strategy has been markedly used in many more facets of society. Donald Trump’s second race for the White House, his campaign, and his entire manifesto are prime examples. He based it all on falsehoods that were so carefully curated that his fans swallow every lie he fed them. Take January 6th, no matter how many times he is proven wrong, Trump has been able to make millions of Americans believe the elections were really stolen from him and that the government is capable of such a thing.
When the most powerful people in the world are able to create mass mobilisation through repeated lies and manipulation, it makes you question whether we as a collective are entering a new era of post-truth where hard facts regrettably take second place.
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