Henri Cartier-Bresson
Born in
1908 to a
French family in the textile business, Cartier-Bresson broke away early, enamored of the emphasis on
personal intuition and the
anti-institutional revolt of the emerging movement of
surrealism. He studied
his first love of
painting with several teachers, and at the age of
twenty-two went to
Africa where he
hunted by the light of an
acetylene lamp strapped to his head. Two years later, in
1932, Cartier-Bresson began a three-year period of photographing in
Europe and
Mexico.
Working with a
Leica, a small, quiet
35 mm rangefinder camera whose use has since become almost a
Magnum trademark, Cartier-Bresson photographed the street, calling his work, "the organic coordination of elements seen by the eye."
In
1948 he became one of the founders of Magnum a now world famous photo agency.
"In
photography there is a new kind of
plasticity," Cartier-Bresson wrote in
1952, "product of the instantaneous lines made by movements of the subject. We work in unison with movement as though it were a presentiment of the way in which life itself unfolds. But inside movement there is one moment at which the elements in motion are in balance.
Photography must seize upon this moment and hold immobile the equilibrium of it."
Bresson coined the term "
Decisive moment" to describe what he was attempting to capture with his
camera. It has since become a
mantra to
photographers the world over.
These days Bresson devotes his time mainly to his first love painting, but is known to now and again take on a portrait assignment.
some of the info in this
node was obtained at
www.magnumphotos.com