Review by Choice Review
Before he died in 2004, noted French photographer Cartier-Bresson set up a foundation to house his work. This book, published to accompany an exhibition at the foundation's home in Paris, is the first to derive from its archive. The title of this book devoted to Cartier-Bresson's portraiture comes from his 1996 statement, reprinted here, in which he compares photographic portraiture with that of the drawn image. The 94 photographs are well reproduced; there is a brief introductory text by Agnes Sire, curator of the foundation, and a more interpretive essay by Jean-Luc Nancy, a professor of philosophy. This is the second book devoted exclusively to Cartier-Bresson's portraits (Photoportraits, CH, Apr'86), and it includes many well-known pictures and some never before published. Photographic portraits may not be what Cartier-Bresson will be most remembered for; nevertheless, this book represents a facet of his work in a well-designed format, with a subtle juxtaposition of images and a judicious selection of his total output. ^BSumming Up: Recommended. General readers; lower-division undergraduates through professionals. P. C. Bunnell emeritus, Princeton University
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Published to coincide with the first exhibition at the Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson in Paris, this handsome collection spanning 70 years of image-making gathers 97 portraits by one of the defining photographers of the 20th century. Stripping away artifice from his subject, Cartier-Bresson could capture a personality with a click of his legendary Leica. The book collects portraits of world leaders, artists, celebrities and ordinary citizens, including many famous images-e.g., Sartre and Pouillon standing on Pont Des Arts-and a few iconic ones, like a young Truman Capote on a New Orleans bench engulfed by large leaves. Several pictures, including arresting images of Carson McCullers, Joan Mir?, Susan Sontag and Francis Bacon, are previously unpublished. Some of the images confirm the persona of the subject: Carl Jung puffing on his pipe and William Faulkner rolling up his shirt sleeves as dogs nip at his heels. Others shed light on a familiar figure: Martin Luther King lost in thought at his cluttered desk, pen in one hand and his forehead resting in the other. These masterful photos blend the spontaneity of a great snapshot with the highly organized composition of a classical painting. 97 tritone reproductions. (May) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Henry Cartier-Bresson, who helped define the field of artistic photo reportage in the 20th century, was a prime inspiration to successive generations of artists well before his death in 2004. This book by Sire (director, Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson, Paris) and Nancy (philosophy, Universit? Marc Bloch, Strasbourg) presents 97 of the master's portraits, which appeared in a recent exhibition in Paris and span seven decades of his career. The portraits depict the famous and the less well known and capture Cartier-Bresson's "perfect moment" in both the corporeal and psychic senses, expanding on the undeniable prescience of this photographer's lens and compelling the viewer's attention. As with his other work, there is a formal, subtle, and uncanny logic to these black-and-white compositions, some of them previously unpublished. Alexander Calder, the patriarch of kinetic sculpture, is placed in a frame dominated by structural beams suspended above his doglike grin. A wizened Ezra Pound looks empty-souled, his freakish halo of white hair spotlighted by raking sunlight at St. Elizabeth's Hospital. And the boyish Truman Capote withdraws to an even smaller size amid broadleaf hothouse plants. This fine update to Cartier-Bresson's long out-of-print Photoportraits (1985) is highly recommended for all libraries.-Douglas F. Smith, Oakland P.L., CA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
