Overview:

To celebrate the centenary of the birth of Henri Cartier-Bresson, the Art Institute is assembling an exhibition that features not only the artist's photographs but also works by his contemporaries in Paris.

The legendary photojournalist whose work was characterized by the term “the decisive moment” started his studies with painting and listening to Surrealist poets in the cafes of Paris in the late 1920s. Although his photographs were about time and timing, a certain sense of composition, as well as an appreciation for the irrational and the suggestions of the subconscious mind, echo the work of the painters in Paris at the time. Work by his painting instructor André Lhote parallels Cartier-Bresson’s early photographs, as does that of Salvador Dali. Examples from these artists will be on view, along with Cartier-Bresson’s photographs. Also included will be work by Pablo Picasso, Giorgio de Chirico, Henri Matisse, and Piet Mondrian that relates to photographs by André Kertész, Brassaï, and other photographers active in Paris between the World Wars.