Henri Cartier-Bresson (August 22, 1908 - August 3 2004) was a French photographer. He was commonly considered the undisputed master of candid photography using the small-format rangefinder camera.

Considered by most to be the father of photojournalism, Cartier-Bresson exclusively used Leica 35 mm rangefinder cameras equipped with normal 50mm lenses or occasionally a telephoto for landscapes. Along with Robert Capa and other photographers, Cartier-Bresson founded Magnum, the first photographic cooperative, in 1947.

Biography

Henri Cartier-Bresson was born in 1908 in Chanteloup-en-Brie , France, of prosperous middle-class parents. His interest in photography started at a very early age. As a boy, Cartier-Bresson owned a Box Brownie, which he used for taking holiday snapshots. Later, he experimented with a 3 1/4" x 4 1/4" view camera. Cartier-Bresson's early training in art (for two years, he studied painting in a Paris studio) helped develop a subtle and sensitive eye for composition. This was seen as one of Cartier-Bresson's greatest assets as a photographer.

In 1931, at the age of 22, Cartier-Bresson went to the West African bush as a hunter. After a year, he returned to France after catching blackwater fever. During the convalescence, he first truly discovered photography. He later recalled how he "prowled the streets all day, feeling very strung-up and ready to pounce, determined to 'trap' life, to preserve life in the act of living."

When World War II broke out, Cartier-Bresson briefly served in the French Army. During the Battle of France, he was captured by the Germans. After two unsuccessful tries, he escaped from a prisoners of war camp, and worked with the French Resistance until the war's end.

He was believed dead in 1946, the Museum of Modern Art in New York organised a posthumous exposition.

In 1947, Cartier-Bresson helped form the Magnum photo agency. Assignments for major magazines took him across Europe and the United States, to India, Russia and China. Many books of his photographs were published in the 50s and 60s; the most famous was The Decisive Moment (1952). In The Decisive Moment, Cartier-Bresson said that the decisive moment is

the simultaneous recognition, in a fraction of a second, of the significance of an event as well as the precise organization of forms which gives that event its proper expression... In photography, the smallest thing can be a great subject. The little human detail can become a leitmotif.

A major milestone in his career was a massive, 400-print retrospective exhibition, which toured the United States in 1960. He was the winner of the 1982 Hasselblad Award

Cartier-Bresson died in Céreste (Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, France) on August 3, 2004 at the age of 95.

External links

• Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson
• Tête &agrave Tête: Portraits by Henri Cartier-Bresson
• Magnum Photos Homepage
• Henri Cartier-Bresson / When Photography Becomes Art (Dutch)