Henri Cartier-Bresson - Inspiration from Masters of Photography

Its hard not to think about Henri Cartier-Bresson when it comes to street photography and photojournalism. He was a french photographer who is strongly believed to be the father of modern photojournalism and life reportage styles. An Early adopter of the 35mm format, Henri introduced the vision for candid photography in streets and showed way for numerous photographers to follow this style. The term Decisive moment coined by him is one of the key aspects in his photography, where he strongly believes there is nothing in this world without a decisive moment.

It is a renowned fact that Henri, having inspired from Martin Munkacsi’s works changed his interest from painting into becoming a full time photographer. He often called his Leica Camera as an extension to his eye. It was during this time there was a wonderful relationship between three photographers Henri, Robert Capa and David Seymour who helped to culture the raw art of photography in those days.

“Be a photojournalist. If not you will fall into mannerism. Keep surrealism in your little heart, my dear. Don’t fidget. Get moving” was the motto for them as they believed.

This early friendship helped these amazing photographers to start the great Magnum foundation along with William Vandivert and George Rodger. Magnum was a cooperative picture agency owned by its members. The team split photo assignments among the members. This foundation is still considered to be the most prestigious one in terms of photojournalism.

After the world war II, Henri did travel to lot of countries through his photography. He became the first Western photographer to photograph “freely” in the post-war Soviet Union. He died in 2004, aged 95. It is Phenomenal how his view and grand vision on photography has taught early lessons and also the eyes for photography to generations to follow.

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