Memorium Henri Cariter-Bresson

The photographer Henri Cartier Bresson died yesterday. He was 95, and while he hadn't taken photographs for a while, he will still be missed. He was my favourite. Now, I don't know much about photography, or art in general. I know about Cartier-Bresson only because I once saw an exhibit of his work in (I think) Lucerne's Museum of Photography. Maybe it was ten years ago but I still remember it, my first sight of the man leaping.

I'm sure there are better fine arts photographers, better focus, depth of field, better composition. But I love Cartier-Bresson. I love his quirky black humour, his eye for the unseen hand in the landscape.

But mostly I love the way he could make a photograph that is not a "moment's monument" (as DG Rossetti said of the sonnet), but a moment itself. Movement and life in flash and silver. I know it's impossible. But he made it seem true.