'In order to give meaning to the world, you have to be involved with what you see. That demands concentration, feeling, a disciplined mind and spatial insight.' Those are the words of Henri Cartier-Bresson, without doubt one of the most influential photographers of the 20th century. His photographs, although made from a journalistic perspective, have the specific gravity of art. Whether they are of people, cities or landscapes, Cartier-Bresson always seeks the 'decisive moment' - the fraction of a second in which the essence of the event becomes visible. It gives his photographs a universal appeal.
Cartier-Bresson was among the founders of Magnum in 1947, and has photographed on every continent. He was in India during the decolonisation and in China when Mao Tse-tung assumed power. In 1954 he was the first foreign photographer allowed into the USSR. At the end of the 1960s Cartier-Bresson (b. 1908) laid aside his Leica to again concentrate on the passion of his youth: painting and drawing.