Henri Cartier -Bresson RIP

Poststructural Pub
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A decisive moment.

Henri Cartier Bresson dies aged 95

Leaving behind unforgettable images.

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“In whatever one does, there must be a relationship between the eye and the heart. With the one eye that is closed, one looks within, with the other eye that is open, one looks without.”

~Henri Cartier Bresson

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I guess I didn’t know he was still alive. I have books by Ansel Adams, Annie Liebowicz and others, and it’s Cartier-Bresson’s I look at the most. Well him and Walker Evans.

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You could try a thousand times and not get that photo. And there’s no way you can get the decisive moment with a digital. The moment’s a second and a half past when the shutter clicks. You need a Leica.

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Viewing and studying Henri Cartier-Bresson was certainly a pivotal moment for me as a junior photographer. The “decisive moment” thought in the capturing of a photograph is something one NEVER forgets. In fact, in nearly all situations I am drawn to the concept before the shutter opens and the image has settled in the emulsion.

It was years after my days at Ryerson when I got the chance to see a print by Cartier-Bresson at my friend’s (Brian Orser) house. It was a glorious image of a kid in the street carrying 2 wine bottles with a sh*t-eating grin on his mug, another girl behind him admiring his status.

A few weeks ago I was at the Guggenheim Museum in NYC. An astonishing gallery of images assembled - the concept being hands. http://www.guggenheim.org/exhibitions/buhl/flash.htmlAgain, another simply captivating photograph of a man kissing a Cardinal’s hands. (It’s a briliant show with some of my other favourites: Irving Penn, Alfred Stieglitz, Edward Steichen, Diane Arbus and more - if you’re in New York you really shold check it out !).

Anyway, Cartier-Bresson was a founder of Magnum Photos http://www.magnumphotos.com/c/htm/StaticPage_MAG.aspx?Stat=Menu_About&page=../../Static/AboutMagnum.htm and became much quieter later on in lfe. Apparently never wanted his art to be proclaimed as high art, rather would remain much more modest.

Thanks M. Cartier-Bresson! You inspired many.