Henri Cartier-Bresson: The Impassioned Eye

[alvin_wong]

<p>Saw a review for this <a

href="http://movies2.nytimes.com/2006/01/13/movies/13cart.html">film</a>

about Henri Cartier-Bresson on the New York Times's website. This

film might be worth seeing. The article lists Quad Cinema as the

current exhibition venue.</P>

[Uhooru]

Interesting. I would have though of him with the dispassionate eye.

[jd_rose]

Mr. Fisher,

 

Please interpret. I am not exactly sure what you are saying?

 

-- JDR

[Uhooru]

I always felt HCB's pictures had a "coolness" to them. I would consider photographers like

Eugene Smith and Sebastiano Salgado to exhibit a "passionate" eye. So called "concerned"

photographers. I don't think HCB's photos are that and that's more of how I would

describe passion in terms of an ones photographs.

 

Though HCB was not what I would call a socially concerned photographer per se. He was a

careful and astute observer of people. But I don't think he was overly interested in the

people he photographed because his photographs to me weren't necccessarily concerned

with the individuals he captured but more about the revelation of aspects the human

condition and often the quirks and foibles of humans. They were revealing and wry, and

often not kind which to me is a "cool" quality of mind. Often, the human was important

only because of how they fit into the rest of the photo as an element albit and important

one, but a peice none the less. I guess what I'm saying is he had a fabulous abilty to

observe humans dispassionately and to see them as they are, in a particular moment, but

his photographs do not exhibit sympatico for his subjects. Don't mistake this as

disapproval my part, I'm just giving my impressions and I could be completely wrong.

What are your thoughts?

[matt_chamberlain]

My ever-thoughtful girlfriend surprised me with tickets to see "The Impassioned Eye" last weekend in Manhattan. The film was wonderfully done, and I highly recommend anyone interested in photography to see this film. I am the photographer of the couple, but my girlfriend who studied art history at university and works in the art book publishing industry absolutely adored the film and couldn't stop talking about how passionate this "cute old man" seemed about photography, even this late in life, years after he stopped taking photos on a regular basis.

<br><br>

Highly recommended. Go see it.

[leslie_cheung]

I agree w/ Barry. HCB always wanted to be an artist more than merely a pj. Not that he didn't care at all about the subjects but just care about what was on the negative more. Having said that HCB was honorable in the sense that many photographers/pj hide behind "I care about the people first" while really they just want to get the photographs...

[ray .]

Barry's half right I think. Certainly someone like Winogrand was

"cooler" toward his human subjects than HCB. Take a look at

some Bresson photographs again, and I think you'll see that they

portray people in mostly a postive light.

 

Thanks for the info on the film.

[Uhooru]

Yeah Ray, it depends on what you are considering cool. But I'd also say that Winograd

was all about the people in the photo as well as the pictorial arrangement. In that sense I

think he was more passionate than HCB. When I say "unkind" and "cool" relating to HCB

its not because, I think he had particular animus toward them, but more that he just wasn't

concerned about how they came off as subjects at all. If they looked odd or compromised

in some fashion because that is what that moment seemed to reveal, that was that.

Likewas if they looked attractive. He was concerned with capturing what he believed was

the fleeting truth of the moment. I would say his main concern was how they visually

inter-acted with the other elements in the picture frame in the moment to portray a

revelation of the moment. I believe for him this took precedence in his photography over

any humanistic concern with subjects. This, to me is essentially a dispassionate approach.

What I would consider a "cool" or detached outlook. I'm not saying he was out to make

people look bad as to him I believe notions of that kind of good or bad were largely

irrelevant to his photography.

[Uhooru]

But JD Rose asked me the question, I wonder what his thoughts are? JD?

[Uhooru]

Ray, another way is, I guess I'm saying that HCB was at core essence a formalist.

[doris_chan]

I think Barry is right in surmising that HCB was a dispassionate photographer. His

detached approach to photography/life/politics even led to the resignation of (the deeply

passionate, deeply "concerned") Kryn Taconis from Magnum.

[ray .]

Winogrand was a formalist too, just had a different interpretation

of what he wanted formally. Actually I'm not sure of any

successful photographer or visual artist who isn't to some

degree a formalist... I disagree with you and think that HCB for

the most part portrayed people sympathetically, aside from

whatever his formal concerns were. But what does it matter?

That's how art is, people view and interpret things differently.

Besides, we're assigning verbal interpretations to visual things,

which is going to be imperfect anyway.

[ray .]

I don't know Doris, I just don't get the feeling looking at HCB's

work that he was dispassionate toward people. And if in fact

Bresson chose to separate himself from politics at some point, I

don't think that means anything other than that he chose to

separate himself from politics. He's still a humanist. His

photographs are not only about formalism. In fact his kind of

formalism implies harmony for his subject.

[Spearhead]

I'd like to see the movie, but this bothered me:<p><i>The keys to taking a good portrait, insists Cartier-Bresson, are making people forget they're in front of a camera and seizing the moment of truth as it passes</i><P>

 

since some of my favorite portraitists (HCB not in that category) take the opposite approach. Avedon, Disfarmer, Arbus, Sherman (haha), even Araki, they all know that a portrait is an interaction and not a truth.

[doris_chan]

It's difficult to make a rational assessment of HCB because of the power of the myth, and

the avalanche of adulatory material. Clearly he was very talented, but not uniquely so, and

not even for the era in which he was working. As to whether he was "dispassionate",

maybe Ray can link to some of his more "passionate" images - I'm open to being

convinced. To me, even his pictures at the time of the Paris liberation are curiously cool

compared to those of his contemporaries. His refusal (for fear of reprisals from the French

government) to allow Magnum to market the Taconis material from Algeria also suggests a

dispassionate, cool figure.

 

The importance of HCB has been massively overplayed by the media, photographers

working today have been much more heavily influenced by people like Frank, Klein,

Eggleston......

[Spearhead]

I forgot to mention Seydou Keita, another portraitist whose work required a knowledge of the camera by the subjects.

 

I agree with Doris - the legend seems bigger than the work. I think part of this is that he really was closer to the surrealist ethic, which was dispassionate, than to photojournalism.

[ray .]

Just by the fact he chose to photograph people tell me he's not

dispassionate about them, whether or not he's as passionate as

Salgado, as an example. People dispassionate re people tend

to photograph buildings or trees.

[Spearhead]

I'm not sure I agree with that. Disfarmer was obviously a misanthrope, yet did phenomenal photographs of people.

[spanky]

Jeff brings up a good point in mentioning HCBs' association with the Surrealist movement. He was even a friend of Andre Breton (sp) the leader of the Surrealist Movement in France that florished during the 20's onward which basically was a refinded continuation of the Dadda movement and attended some of their gatherings. Although HCBs' approach seemed to be to wait for all the elements in the scene to achieve a kind of harmony this was actually counter to many of the Surrealists ideas on creating art. Surrealists drew heavy from the then controversial theories of Freud and used psychoanalysis techniques like free association to create their strange images and writings. While I don't see anything surreal in HCB's work, I have no doubt that the group and their approach was an inspiration.

[doris_chan]

Ray, look in a dictionary for definitions of the word "dispassionate". The simple act of

photographing people doesn't contradict the notion that HCB was dispassionate.

[ray .]

So, you think he didn't have a strong feeling- was indifferent-

toward people? I find that highly unlikely.

[doris_chan]

Ray, I think we have different dictionaries, I believe that he was "not influenced by strong

emotion". I don't believe he was misanthropic, but I do believe that he was more interested

in the form than the emotion of peoples lives - he was a benign, but uninvolved observer.

Interestingly, he was appalled by the work of Martin Parr and fought against him being

admitted to Magnum.

[ray .]

I suppose the question could be asked then- Is a quiet person

less influenced by emotion than one who acts out? Perhaps

Bresson didn't manifest his emotion in his photographs as

others saw fit, but that doesn't mean he wasn't influenced by

emotion or feeling for his subject. I guess I just read his

photographs differently. In the best of his work, there's a feeling

of wonder expressed about the world in general, whether

through geometry and form, or whatever. Not sure how you can

be more emotional than that.

[ray .]

Admittedly I don't look at his work so much anymore. Perhaps

I'm defending him a little because his photographs were the first

that really caught my eye. The body of work may not be up to his

reputation, and some do not hold up, but there were certainly a

few magestic home runs.

[ray .]

majestic