The exhibits at the Vivian Maier exhibition Photo: Courtesy of the Today Art Museum

A new exhibition at the Today Art Museum in Beijing seeks to take visitors on a journey through the life of the US' legendary nanny-turned photographer Vivian Maier. 

Maier, who worked as a governess for more than 40 years, had been a relative unknown in the photo world until the discovery of her archive in 2007, which included hundreds of her photographs that earned her a place in the history of street photography. 

Working with Today Art Museum curator Jess Zhang, exhibition curator Anne Morin brings together 83 photographs by Maier taken from the 1950s to the 1980s to Beijing. 

"What remains tangible are her photographs, and that is what matters in the end. An archive is valued at nearly 120,000 images, and numerous self- portraits. Indeed, self-portraits mark her journey as a photographer throughout her life with a certain insistence, and perseverance in knowing who she was, even a self-actualization achieved through the photographic gesture," Morin wrote in the preface. 

In the eyes of Jess Zhang, Maier was a key figure who "recorded the changes of the times, and loved society and life."

The exhibition is scheduled to run until June 30.