Henri Cartier-Bresson

[Bertram2]

From time to time I blow dust off some photo books and watch photos of famous photographers, not only to get some new inspiration but to check if and how my perception of their work and style has changed by the time, depending on my own ( hopefully positive) development of style and craft.

It's always very entertaining and very educational too, because each time i watch these photos again they look different, some reveal a new artistical value and some their weak points which I had not seen at the last "review".

About HCB I am still a bit ambivalent:
HCB is much more famous than many of his friends and contemporary collegues are like Doisneau, Ronis, Izis, Boubat and some others, who partly have belonged to the Magum founders and/or have worked for an idea called Photographie Humaine, building quite a similar portfolio during their lifetime.

I'd be interested in opinions about this frontrunner position he could undoubtedly achieve. If there are any at all, what are the elements of his craft which make him unique and does this justify his superior reputation from the artistic point of view ? Is there anything which makes him "better" in other words ?

Best regards,
Bertram

 

[cp_ste.croix]

I think he most articulately described the "art" of photography before anyone else did, and showed how classic lines from painting and drawing might be applied to photos. Doing this, when he did, served to help legitimize photography as an actual art rather than mere reportage.

Is his work my favourite? No, but I do love much of it.

I'll be thumbing through some photo books tommorrow, as I get to spend the day Subbing for my old highschool photography teacher. He has a copy of Robert Frank's 'the Americans'...

 

[GeneW]

One of the ironies is that HCB, from what I've read, never sought to be famous. He studied art before he discovered photography and I think that his art background informs many of his images. There's something in the composition and balance of some of his work that makes them broadly appealing. Not that he's better than others of his generation, but his work had widespread appeal. And maybe even his name sounded interesting.

Someone once described a chipmunk as 'a mouse with good press'. HCB was certainly a photographer with good press.

Gene

 

[Bertram2]

CP and Gene,

you both refer to the same point, that's interesting and plausible too for me. France is in a sense of a ethnological and cultural unit a quite old country compared to other european states and this might be the reason why it always thought in hierarchical categories up to the 20th century.
When photography first came up in the 19th century the first thing which happend was that the community of the established painters said "This is NO art, just a gimmick!!"
Same happened to the impressionists too as you know, quite at the same time .
And i think this was changing first in the 20s of the 20th century when the effects of WWI
allowed all artists to unchain themselves (l' art pour l'art) from the powerful control of the established art scene , which was always strongly ancored in the ruling class too.
If this is all true then it sounds plausible that HCB's style, integrating the rules of artistic work, has been something like an appeasement of photography and art, and maybe this was his special merit which makes him for some people still a bit more important than other contemporary photographers, working on the same idea.

Leaving aside the general esthetic lead he achieves (partly) by his "art-style" to me it seems that his "slices of life" cut in the "decisive" moment sometimes are more vivdid and have a stronger impact to the spectator , beeing somehow a more condensed extract than the photos of his contemporary collegues.

At this point I differ a bit from Gene tho I admit that HCB could not hold his outstanding
level over all his work and tho I agree that he knew very well how to sell his work and how to get it respected by the opinion-leaders.

Thanks for the input, it has been interesting to read it, not only because it has confirmed soem of my own thoughts . ;-)

Best regards,
bertram

 

[kbg32]

Not only did Cartier-Bresson study art, he also worked in the film industry before taking up photography. He worked on some films of Renoir's before WWll.

 

[FrankS]

90% of success is due to marketing.

 

[Bertram2]

90% of success is due to marketing.

Wow , this does not sound as if you were a HCB fan ! ;-)
Best,
Bertram

 

[RML]

Wow , this does not sound as if you were a HCB fan ! ;-)
Best,
Bertram

But I Frank hit the nail on the head. HCB was not one to refrain from promoting himself. IMO there are better contemporary photogs (Kertesz comes to mind) than HCB. But that does not mean HCB did some very nice (if not great) work.

 

[Flyfisher Tom]

Just a personal opinion, but HCB's work has a more artistic, geometric style than his other contemporaries. The others' works share some plane of similarity, but HCB's work simply has an extra element of artistic juxtaposition that takes it apart from mere photojournalism. In fact, I think it is a misnomer to term HCB as a photojournalist. His work does not reflect photojournalism and reportage, per se, but more about his unique sense of composition. Is he a better photojournalist or photographer? I don't think so. But I do think that his photos withstand the review of time due to their unique separation from journalistic works. Ironically, the one photographer today whose work melds photojournalism and art in my opinion, is James Nachtwey, who not only achieves reportage, but does so also in a uniquely 'artistic' way.

 

[FrankS]

Oh, no. I love HCB! But I have noticed that artistic talent alone is rarely enough to ensure success. Marketing and business skills are much more effective in this regard.

 

[peter_n]

I would agree with Tom in that HCB's compositions are what set him apart from others. You can look at many of HCB's more famous pictures for a very long time because in compositional terms there is so much inside the frame. Then you can come back and find you have missed something. None of it is an accident either - he had just an incredible eye.

 

[Bertram2]

Oh, no. I love HCB! But I have noticed that artistic talent alone is rarely enough to ensure success. Marketing and business skills are much more effective in this regard.

Frank,
sorry, a misunderstanding. Of course you are right in general, no matter if art or cars or what else , if you want to sell something the marketing solely decides if you will be successful or not , quality only can't . What does not say that quality can't be a part of the marketing strategy from the beginning on.

Best,
Bertram

 

[Bertram2]

. His work does not reflect photojournalism and reportage, per se, but more about his unique sense of composition.
The one photographer today whose work melds photojournalism and art in my opinion, is James Nachtwey, who not only achieves reportage, but does so also in a uniquely 'artistic' way.

Agreed as far as HCB is meant, absolutely.
Nachtwey's photos indeed do have a very strong artistic expression very often which raises them to a level different from pure journalism. But they do not have this element of composition which HCB's photos mostly have. My personal perception only..
Best,
Bertram

 

[Roman]

Nice to see other Nachtwey fans here to - along with Salgado and Corbijn he is one of my favorite contemporary photographers.

Roman

 

[childers-jk]

This is one great thread!! I enjoy hearing about how others feel about this topic. So I will drop my 2 cents worth here 🙂.

I really liked HCB's philosophy more than his photography. Perhaps I looked for more in his subject capture. I don't know, but his words touched me to the core. His idea was to caputer that one single event that spoke volumes about the scene. There is story in every photo, and capturing the essence of the subject is, to me, what HCB aimed for. You could even take this beyon photojournalism and street photograpy, into portrature and other areas of photography. It was HCB's words, not his photos that inspire me and for that I will be eternally grateful.

Jeff

 

[kbg32]

World Socialist Web Site

Henri Cartier-Bresson: From a higher reality to a respect for reality

By Stuart Nolan and Barbara Slaughter
5 November 1999

An exploration of film

Cartier-Bresson was fascinated by the possibilities of the moving image. It is said that his bursts of creativity in photography were intervals between his interest in other forms of artistic expression. He studied film in New York under Paul Strand. Possibly he was trying to discover, as in Africa, an instrument that would be even more immediate than his camera in capturing the scars of the world.

His concerns over the rise of fascism were growing. This was a tumultuous period in politics and in his artistic evolution, in which he was reconsidering the relationship between art and social revolution. On returning to Paris in 1936 he assisted the director Jean Renoir on his 1937 propagandist film, La Vie est à Nous [ People of France], for the left Popular Front government. Cartier-Bresson criticised the film as “doctrinaire”, but at the same time he said it expressed the “great feeling” there was for the “Front Populaire.” During the Spanish civil war he co-directed an anti-fascist film with Herbert Kline, promoting the Republican medical services. Cartier-Bresson himself filmed a group of young children playing in the streets. This brief sequence is very beautiful, catching the children's unaffected joyful movement. For him, the freedom of childhood had become a symbol of liberty. He worked as an actor in Renoir's 1936 film Un Parti de Campagne [ A Day in the Country], also in the 1939 La Règle du Jeu [ The Rules of the Game], where he was second assistant. Renoir made him act, so he could understand what it felt like on the other side of the camera.

Cartier-Bresson explains his artistic and personal responses to his experience with film: “A movie director for me is a fiction writer. It's telling the story, which is a wonderful thing, and directing and I'm incapable of giving orders to an actor ... it's not my world.” He was dissatisfied with what he perceived as a lack of spontaneity in the detailed planning and construction needed for filmmaking. It is not necessary to agree with Cartier-Bresson about film to understand that photography was better suited to his artistic talents and temperament.

 

[kiev4a]

Oh, no. I love HCB! But I have noticed that artistic talent alone is rarely enough to ensure success. Marketing and business skills are much more effective in this regard.

Marketing and preception is everything. About three years ago there was an article in PopPhotography on a woman who was having a exhibition in New York. (can't remember her name). She shoots all he stuff with a 50-year-old camera that I think has one lens setting and one shutter speed. The work shown in the magazine were of out of focus shapes -- primarily plants. Some shots obviously were blurred by camera movement. Others had flare that almost obscured the subject matter. It's the sort of stuff most of us would be ashamed to even print, let alone display in public -- a how not to take pictures essay. But in the art community the lady is considered brilliant. All it takes it one well-known celebrity to say something is wonderful and suddenly it is "creative genius" instead of wasted film.

 

[taffer]

Yes the 'Emperor's new clothes' syndrome is always out there, but in the end it's all about subject and idea. Marketing don't last forever, ideas do 🙂

Btw to be honest, a year and half ago I didn't even know who HCB was. I like his work but found that Doisneau's one calls me more.

But my copy of 'Bystander' is still lost in the limbo :bang:

 

[Bertram2]

There is story in every photo, and capturing the essence of the subject is, to me, what HCB aimed for. You could even take this beyon photojournalism and street photograpy, into portrature and other areas of photography. It was HCB's words, not his photos that inspire me and for that I will be eternally grateful.
Jeff

Jeff,
There is indeed some contradiction between words an photos, I mean a careful artistic compositon following the rules of painting and catching the "decisive" moment in a split of a second does not go together well. He explained it it with his ability of realizing instinctively the the right moment for that all, at this point I do NOT believe him.
What I think is that he picked the "hits" from a bunch of shots later ,when it was all developed ;-)
Best,
Bertram

 

[Bertram2]

He worked as an actor in Renoir's 1936 film Un Parti de Campagne [ A Day in the Country], also in the 1939 La Règle du Jeu [ The Rules of the Game], where he was second assistant. Renoir made him act, so he could understand what it felt like on the other side of the camera.

I've seen "Un Parti de Campagne" several times but I never realized that HCB was playing as an actor there ! Sensational news, will keep an eye on him next time !
BUT: I got a video tape of a meeting of Jean Renoir and Michel Simon, who were good friends, meeting shortly before Renoir's death and talking about "Baudu sauvee des eaux" with Rivette who filmed their conversation for 2 hours or so. And as far as I remember there is a gent to be seen for some seconds, doing still photos with a Leica, this must have been his Highness ! 🙂!
Best,
Bertram