He is one of the most famous Leica photographers of the 20th century: As a photojournalist, a freelance photographer and a sensitive portraitist, Henri Cartier-Bresson (1908 – 2004) produced timeless compositions, and was particularly influential and style-defining thanks to his feel for the decisive moment. The Frenchman's early work was inspired by surrealism and the New Vision of the 1920s, before he later travelled the world as a photojournalist and founder of the legendary Magnum Photos Agency. His motifs of spontaneous encounters and situations, and his eye for the everyday life of his contemporaries, have had an important impact on subsequent generations.
