Henri Cartier-Bresson 1908-2004
Cartier-Bresson was known for his candid black and white photographs that were superb compositions and embraced documentary, intimacy with strong visual story telling. He studied for a year at the University of Cambridge before making extensive trips within Europe, the Ivory Coast, and Mexico. After the Second World War he founded the major photography cooperative Magnum Photos alongside Robert Capa, George Rodger, and David “Chim” Seymour.
The decisive moment and Cartier-Bresson are so clearly associated, and yet the decisive moment can easily be misunderstood. Yes, there is often a moment in time when everything visually seems to come together just right, but it is not the only moment in time and what really is important is to find the subject and work it like mad trying to get the composition that is just right. So it is that when you look at the contact sheets of a photographer like Cartier-Bresson you see numerous photographs that are working a particular scene and not just one photograph taken at a particular decisive moment.
Unlike many famous photographers, Cartier-Bresson gave up photography after 30 or so years and instead took to painting. This is another riddle that has taxed the minds of others. Was it due to boredom or lack of reinventing himself? Josef Koudelka suggest something along these lines believing that he may have got in a groove photographing with the same Leica set up with a 50mm lens and not experimenting enough and so became bored with photography. It is true that many Street photographers use a favourite set up often with a 28mm or 35mm lens so maybe this is not the main reason. Perhaps it was more to do with what interested the man ie capturing life in general that was more important than the tools he used. So why not use painting and drawing to express this when he felt he had gone as far as he could with a camera? Maybe painting had always been his passion and success in photography allowed him to pursue this real love of his. People are not always so good at what they really like. The day job or successful career makes it possible for an indulgence in what excites them most. Furthermore, the photography professional is often constrained from taking the photographs that he / she really wants to take.
Given the importance of Cartier-Bresson to documentary and Street photography what were his principle contributions? To answer this question satisfactorily it is necessary to know a bit about his general philosophy. Eric Kim suggests that the book that inspired Cartier-Bresson most was ‘Zen in the art of archery’, and that there is a lot in common between archery, photography and ‘meditative sports’ in general. The contemporary photographer Paul Sanders also emphasises the importance of mindfulness in his own work where curiosity and intrigue as well as the quality of experience are of tantamount importance. It was equally important to Cartier-Bresson to have an open mind, to take candid and un-posed photographs. For him it was important to discover an image and ‘seize it’. Intuition and spontaneity guide him on his path to pressing the camera’s shutter. It is therefore important to be emotionally involved in the photography that you practice. A lot of the best photographs distill the most important aspects of a scene and avoid unnecessary distractions. On the whole they are simple and minimalist. At the same time they give meaning to an otherwise complicated and hard to appreciate world.
When Cartier-Bresson was only 22 he went to Africa for a year. He took many photos with a miniature camera but when he returned to France, after falling ill with blackwater fever, and had the films developed he found that they were ruined by damp. This could have been a major setback but instead he got himself a Leica camera that he really enjoyed. It allowed him to get up close to his subjects and become excited about what photography could achieve.
A small allowance enabled me to get along, and I worked with enjoyment. I had just discovered the Leica. It became the extension of my eye, and I have never been separated from it since I found it. I 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.
Throughout his photographic career Cartier-Bresson considered himself an amateur or one who loved to photograph. This sense of being an amateur should not be confused with someone who doesn’t really know what they are doing. An amateur turned professional is merely defining a change of material interest and not in any change in the love of a pursuit. During the period when Cartier-Bresson was a leading light in the photographic world photojournalism was an important means of making a living. Top photographers aspired to have their photographs published in Life magazine and other similar photo journals. So there was a commercial importance attached to a series of photos to document a story. Photographers of the time including Cartier-Bresson recognised this state of affairs, but perhaps significantly he also considered that a single photo could tell a story although this could be hard to achieve. I think in this respect a lot of his photographs can stand alone and don’t have to be seen in any particular sequence or group.
“Sometimes a single event can be so rich in itself and its facets that it is necessary to move all around it in your search for the solution to the problems it poses– for the world is movement, and you cannot be stationary in your attitude toward something that is moving. Sometimes you light upon the picture in seconds; it might also require hours or days.”
For Cartier-Bresson, photography wasn’t the only route to artistic satisfaction. The camera was just a tool for creating a creative vision. It was his means of allowing everything to come together in a satisfactory and pleasing way.
“My passion has never been for photography ”in itself,“ but for the possibility– through forgetting yourself– of recording in a fraction of a second the emotion of the subject, and the beauty of the form; that is, a geometry awakened by what’s offered. The photographic shot is one of my sketchpads.”
