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The Decisive Moment: What Henri Cartier-Bresson Actually Meant | PetaPixel

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"The decisive moment" popularized by street photography pioneer Henri-Cartier Bresson is widely misunderstood. Here's what he meant.

Copied! The photographic master Henri Cartier-Bresson made some key observations about photography, translated as “ the decisive moment ” which is often (incorrectly) characterized as: “capturing an event that is ephemeral and spontaneous, where the image represents the essence of the event itself.” Much is written about the psychophysical experience of “decisive moments” but these inferences, while interesting and cool, are not what Cartier-Bresson was talking about and the wrong takeaway from his writing. While it might seem like a somewhat academic debate, I not only find Cartie

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