Henri Cartier
Behind the gare St. Lazare, Paris, 1932
Silver gelatin print / Impresión de gelatina de plata
50.8 x 40.6 cm
20 x 16 in
20 x 16 in
© 1932 Henri Cartier-Bresson/ Magnum Photo / Courtesy Fundación AMMA
Photo: Alejandro Paez
Further images
Throughout his career, Cartier-Bresson had the opportunity to photograph figures such as Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, Irène Joliot-Curie, Édith Piaf, Fidel Castro, and Ernesto “Che” Guevara. He also covered major events, including the death of Gandhi, the Spanish Civil War, and Mao Zedong’s triumphant entry into Beijing. He was also the first Western journalist to visit the Soviet Union after Stalin’s death.
However, it is above all in his street photographs of anonymous people that his virtuosity in capturing the “decisive moment” (“à la sauvette” in the original French) is most evident—the fleeting instant in which all the elements align for maximum expressiveness and whose recording depends on the photographer’s skill.
However, it is above all in his street photographs of anonymous people that his virtuosity in capturing the “decisive moment” (“à la sauvette” in the original French) is most evident—the fleeting instant in which all the elements align for maximum expressiveness and whose recording depends on the photographer’s skill.