Goodbye Cartier-Bresson
August 05, 2004

The world just lost one of the greatest photographers of all time, and one of my personal heroes. Bresson was one of my favorite photographers and his work helped fuel my passion for photography when I started to dive deeper into it in the early 1990s. Well, goodbye to yet another master.

From BBC News

Tributes paid to Cartier-Bresson

Friends and colleagues have paid tribute to French photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson who died on Monday.

"France has lost a genius photographer, a real master," said French President Jacques Chirac in a statement.

Mr Chirac described Cartier-Bresson as "one of the most talented artists of his generation, and one of the most respected in the world".

Photographer Lord Snowdon told BBC News 24: "He was brilliant, I will miss him very much."

Long friendship

"I don't think he'd like his work to be called art, he would like to be remembered as an anonymous figure. His books record moments that can't be captured again," he added.

Fellow photographer David Bailey said Cartier-Bresson was a cut above his contemporaries.

"There's a humanity in his pictures... he obviously cares about people and that is partly what makes his pictures magic.

Most photo-journalists need a montage of photos to tell a story, whereas Cartier-Bresson seemed to get it in one shot
David Bailey

"Most photo-journalists need a montage of photos to tell a story, whereas Cartier-Bresson seemed to get it in one shot."

John Morris, friend and former executive of the Magnum photographic agency, which Cartier-Bresson helped found in 1947, also paid his respects.

"He was perhaps the greatest photographer of the 20th century," he said.

Morris first met Cartier-Bresson at the door of the Hotel Scribe in Paris, five days after the Germans left the city at the end of World War II.

Gary Knight, managing director of the photographic agency, VII, said Cartier-Bresson was one of the most influential photographers of all time.

"He inspired people, and he defined photography at that crucial period when small cameras were coming into fashion and its entire nature was changing," Knight said.

French culture minister Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres called Cartier-Bresson, "a great artist and a great reporter, a humanist and a witness to the 20th century who travelled around the world with inexhaustible passion".

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/entertainment/3538008.stm

Published: 2004/08/05 10:28:07 GMT

© BBC MMIV

Posted by Scott at 10:20 AM