Henri Cartier-Bresson was a French humanist photographer. He was considered by many to be a master of candid / street photography, and an early user of 35 mm film. He created the genre of street photography, and viewed photography as capturing a decisive moment. Cartier-Bresson was one of the founding members of Magnum Photos in 1947. Magnum Photos is an international photographic cooperative owned by its members, with offices in New York City, Paris, London and Tokyo.
Cartier – Bresson’s mostly works in black and white and focus’s on elements such as reflection, motion/movement and framing.
He founded the Magnum Photo Agency in 1947 along with 3 other photographers at the time. Magnum Photos now consists of around 80 members who all help run the agency. Magnum Photos also attained the copyrights to all of Cartier – Bresson’s work after he passed away at the age of 96.
Visual – The choice of a black and white image adds to the emotional response created by the viewer and the buildings in the background, bridge in the middle of the shot and the boat in the foreground create a nice sense of depth. The image its self appear to obey to the rule of thirds. The position of the house which symbolises a safe place and then the forest which can symbolism danger and darkness on either side of the image creates a good sense of juxtaposition, especially since the women is running away from the house and towards the forest.
Contextual – This photo could be related to the romantic art movement with the connotations of the river, bridge and possibly a building of importance (church).
Conceptual – Bresson’s idea with this and many of his images was to ‘capture the moment’. He did this perfectly with this picture showing a women running, causing the viewer to question what she is running from.