Henri Cartier-Bresson

The French Culture Ministry announced his death Aug. 4.

Whether snapping pictures of French resistance fighters and Gestapo informers during World War II, the assassination of Gandhi, a grizzled eunuch during the communist revolution in China or a slew of celebrities, Cartier-Bresson was the epitome of the photographer who was at the right place at the right time -- all the time.

His images, mostly taken with a 35 mm Leica perpetually dangling from his neck, were alive with playful shadows and rich geometric patterns based on his early interest in surrealism. He called himself a painter at heart, and the beauty of his shots was heightened by the fact that he never posed or planned them, or later cropped them. Each caught the drama, wit or joy of the immediate, or "decisive," moment.

The Japan Times Weekly: Aug. 14, 2004
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