CHELSEA — As a street photographer in 1940s India, Henri Cartier-Bresson captured many of the country’s defining moments, including the hours before Mahatma Gandhi’s death and the events that followed.
An exhibit opening at the Rubin Museum on April 21 will showcase nearly 70 of those images, as well as letters the French photographer wrote, the camera he used and the “personal ephemera” he left behind when he died in 2004.
“This selection of Cartier-Bresson’s India work includes images of political leaders, refugees from India’s partition from Pakistan and everyday people, offering insight into his deep understanding of issues that continue to resonate today,” the museum said.
When the photographs were published in LIFE magazine, they “catapult[ed] Cartier-Bresson to international fame,” the museum added.
It was Cartier-Bresson who coined the phrase “decisive moment” to describe the important instances he felt street photography should document, exhibit organizer Beth Citron said.
“The exhibition highlights both his photographs of the everyday and many important moments in modern Indian history,” she said.
“They reflect Cartier-Bresson’s mastery of his medium, as well as his abiding interest in the people and sites of India.”
