Blessed by Marilyn Monroe's Ass

I tried to find a biography of Cartier-Bresson (no proper one exists), and came across Pierre Assouline's Henri Cartier-Bresson: A Biography, which sounds more like a compendium of reminiscences from interviews (although I haven't read it), thence to a short article by Peter Conrad from 2005 reviewing the Assouline book in The Guardian. There I found this:

Cartier-Bresson refused to venerate photographs, because they are thefts from life, mortified moments that kill the vitality they adore.

That's a whole lot packed into one sentence, isn't it? First that photographs are a way of adoring vitality (of life, of the world, I assume?), second that they are "thefts," which seems strange because you don't take anything when you take a photograph, third that they are "mortified moments" (he conjures Nabokov's musings on the fact that a butterfly collector kills his butterflies, or at least they did during the great 19th-century taxonomical project, when specimen collecting was thought to be central to naturalism), and finally it implies that some unnamed cohort (other photographers? curators and critics? The audience for art photographs? We aren't told) "venerates" photographs. And of course that our hero has rejected this stance of veneration. I count nine extraordinary assertions in that little sentence, which is beautiful to boot.

The funniest thing in the Peter Conrad article is this, which I've never heard before:

During the war he buried his Leica in a field in the Vosges, and left it there for three years while he continued to take photographs in his head, developing and displaying them in his memory.

After he exhumed the camera, he touchingly sought to reward it by arranging for it to be caressed by Marilyn Monroe's bum. He was at work on the set of The Misfits; Marilyn arrived late for a meal, and moved towards the empty chair on which Cartier-Bresson had rested his lucky Leica. 'Would you give it your blessing?' he asked. She obliged, and with a wicked smirk pretended to sit on it, just brushing it with her behind.

That does sound like something he might do. And yes, he did, fairly often it seems, claim to take pictures in his head that he remembered. I do that too, and probably you do as well. One little problem, though: if both those things happened, they'd be two entirely separate events. The Misfits didn't come out until 1961, long after the war, and it's highly unlikely H.C.-B. was still photographing with the same camera he buried in that field. He started using the M3 as soon as it came out in 1953. But it makes a nice story.

Isn't it odd that there has never been a scholarly biography of Cartier-Bresson? You'd think there would be by now, especially since so many vivid stories and entertaining anecdotes are connected with him. I wonder if any of you have read Pierre Assouline's book. It's not available as an e-book, unfortunately.

 

Mike

P.S. How was that for a clickbait title? I always feel like a fraud when I try to do that. It doesn't come naturally to me.

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Featured Comments from:

Rob Brodman: "I thought it was cute and accurate according to the article and not just click bait. You're the real deal Mike. Don't fret it."

Comments

[Stan Banos]

Was just about to mention the time discrepancy when you then made note of it. The Misfits- one of the greatest movies ever made.

[Lindsay Bach]

I have always called photographs stored in my head "retinographs."

[Greg Heins]

I have read M. Assouline's book. I didn't think I needed to own it, at the time. But yes, why no real biography?
The biography I am yearning for is one of Irving Penn. No one seems to know if one is in the works. As you know, quite often who gets a biography comes down to whose estate is willing to let go of the controls enough.

[darlene]

Yes, I agree your headline is pure clickbait! Nothing wrong with that, IMO, because your article is interesting and ties into the headline.

The quotes lead me to speculate that Cartier-Bresson may have needed something to reinvigorate his spirit. In the first quote, we learn he did not put photographs on a pedestal, believing by capturing a living, vibrant moment and turning it into a still image, he felt that the life and energy of that moment were killed or lost. But then, in the second quote, he desires to have the blessing of Marilyn Monroe's bum adorn his self-defined killing machine. It sounds like the camera in his mind needed something akin to a defibrillator to revive it. After all, burnout is a common experience, and even great artists aren't immune.

I have never been a fan of his photography (Saul Leiter is more up my alley for visual therapy), but I respect his place in history. Maybe you should write the book on Cartier-Bresson that is missing from libraries worldwide.

[Roger]

It's a reasonable headline that's relevant to the article's content. Click bait would have been a title like "I'm Done!" or "I Quit!" implying you're closing your blog when in fact you're just stating you've given up looking for an HCB biography.

YouTube is a masterclass for click bait titles.

[Dogman]

When I clicked on the book link, I was told by Amazon that I bought the hardcover edition in 2007 yet I cannot remember ever having read it. If I did read it, it must not have made a great impression on me. It's probably still around here somewhere, packed away never read or read and forgotten.

[Mike Plews]

If he really wanted to bless that Leica he would have had Doris Day do the job.
Don't believe me? Watch any of her films and count the tushy shots.
Sorry, I'm an old pig and even I offended myself with this but it's history.

[c.d.embrey]

A few people//tribes think that having their photo taken steals their soul. Stop the steal 😉

[Mark Sampson]

HC-B, the sly fox. Twisting and turning, false scents, contradictions; employing his formidable intellectual skills to create an impenetrable thicket of French philosophy, all in order to confound the critics.
And thus leave him the freedom to do his work. (Perhaps only Bob Dylan has been as successful at that game since.)

[david place]

This is available at Archive.org as a pdf.
Link: https://archive.org/details/henricartierbres0000asso
Archive is a great resource for readers as well as photographers!

[Michel Hardy-Vallée]

Scholarly biographies (a.k.a monographs) from a reputable publisher, peer reviewed, and deemed original contribution to knowledge take time. The bigger the name, the longer the struggle. I'm writing one about a relatively obscure Canadian photographer (John Max, 1936-2011), and depending on how you look at it, I've been working on it for over four to twelve years. Four years since the completion of my PhD (my book is derived from my thesis); twelve years since I first became serious about him and started doing research.

With a bigger name like HCB, your challenge will be authority. Who's gonna set the record straight? Who's going to prove that they had access to enough primary materials and archives, did enough interviews, and perused enough sources, to claim dominion over HCB? The latest important book about him was only on a specific dimension of his mythos, see Nadya Bair (2020) The Decisive Network (UC Press). Svetlana Alpers did one about Walker Evans (Starting From Scratch, Princeton UP: 2020), and one of the reasons why is that she's a senior figure with many years of publication behind her.

From a publisher's point of view, would you rather have a young upstart or a respected scholarly figure write the first monograph about an established artist? From the estate's point of view (HCB died in 2004, so he's still under copyright for a while), to whom would you trust your archive and all the associated investments? What if the results of the research end up going into a direction that Magnum/ICP/the HCB estate (i.e. people who still profit from his work) does not like?

Moreover, the idea of a monograph has received a beating over the last decades in academia. Like everything else, it goes in and out of fashion, and the gatekeeping over who is deemed worthy (or not) of a monograph is not necessarily consistent, so the context, the approach, the topic all have to line up to be book-worthy.

Finally, not everybody is up for the kind of long-term commitment that a monograph requires (and I can't blame them). University teaching requires versatility and breadth, so many first books are instead collections of case studies according to a given pattern (say, "five photographers who are interested by construction sites as metaphors of late capitalism").

How long did it take Berenice Abbott to convince the world that Atget was worth it?

[Mike Marcus]

Some years ago when traveling, I bought a little inexpensive book about HC-B that covered, if I recall correctly, his early life, his starting work in art, his associations and influencers at that time, and his move into photography. The book includes reasonably produced, but small, images from his early life, artwork, and photos that gave me a fine introduction to what I wanted to know about HC-B. As I am traveling again I don't have access to that book, but I think it is this one: https://www.amazon.com/Discoveries-Henri-Cartier-Bresson

[Moose]

"I wonder if any of you have read Pierre Assouline's book. It's not available as an e-book, unfortunately."

I did find an ebook - in Portuguese.

Available cheap used. $8, including shipping.

[Portuguese e-books have to be shipped? --Mike]

[Jim Arthur]

A very different perspective was featured on 60 Minutes tonight. They replayed an interesting piece on photojournalist James Nachtwey that I had never seen before and which presented many of his amazing images. A couple of his statements discussed during the interview were that photos can speak and the camera is a weapon. Interesting stuff. I also found a short 60 Minutes Overtime piece on YouTube for this interview which featured a few more of his images.

[Ilkka]

I have that book and I think it is quite okay as a biography. I read it long ago when it first came out and was just planning to read it again couple of months ago but then chose to read something else instead. It is on my list of books to read again.
I wouldn’t say that it is just written from some interviews. But I don’t remember very much in detail until I read it again.
There is quite a good book that is a compilation of his interviews, put together by aperture: interviews and conversations. That talks quite a lot about his equipment as well, refuting the common impression that he only used 50mm lens. Those two books and a selection of his photographs would combine into a very good description of his life and work.
It seems that he did become quite a grumpy old man in his later years and made all sorts of strange comments.

[Robert Stahl]

Loved the mention that Cartier-Bresson did not want to venerate his
photographs. Writer Natalie Goldberg in her wonderful book 'Writing
Down the Bones' in a chapter entitled We Are Not The Poem reminds
her readers not to get caught up in kudos or praise for their poems.
As she put it, " The power is always in the act of writing. Come back
to that again and again and again. Don't get caught in the admiration
for your poems." English artist William Blake said much the same
thing when he wrote, "Kiss the joy as it flies."

[stelios]

I started reading the book some time ago, and stopped part-way through. Found it boring, maybe a bit pretentious even. Can't remember clearly, it didn't leave a mark. I'd rather look at his pictures than that book.

[Anton Wilhelm Stolzing]

Cartier-Bresson - the man and the myths.
Cartier-Bresson was prisoner of war of the Germans and escaped. He then took photos of the résistance, the German retreat and the liberation of Paris. Insofar, if he really buried his Leica, he must have used another camera then, LOL. The wikipedia-article where I got this information from also writes: "He photographed in black and white because of the artistic impact of BW which he held in high esteem." This statement is misleading because he also took photos in colour.
There are so many misleading or even utterly wrong statements about HCB.

[aaron c greenman]

Mike,

I had the opportunity recently to visit the HCB Foundation in Paris to see some of his lesser known photographs take in the industrial north of England, shown alongside Martin Parr’s photographs of the same subjects.

One interesting point too that the foundation makes is that while HCB would sometimes give prints of his work to his friends, he never sold prints commercially and according to his will they should never be sold after his death. So the foundation makes it clear that any prints of his work - if not able to be traced back specifically to him or one of his friends - is unauthorized.

I found this interesting that his own exhibitions are the only way to view his work. He had family money I understand so there was never really any pressure for him to have to make money through his photography.

ACG

[Stephen Jenner]

Perhaps there is not a biography of the man, because there was nothing much to say about him.

He spoke with his camera, and his snaps are in many galleries around the world.

We know that he was posh, and we know that he was expensively educated.

He seems to have spent his life trying to be invisible as he did his private little dance through the streets, his Leica concealed in his palm, showing only the back of his hand. Until, "the decisive moment".

Presumably, he awoke in the morning and had his breakfast, read the paper, which he likely viewed through his very French (theoretical) communist slant. Then he went out with his concealed camera and attempted to prove to himself that things were as he thought they were. I say theoretical because ever since the true levellers, the theory has generally led to "Right thinking". Levellers and true levellers being largely responsible for the forming of White America.

I think that he succeeded in his quest, and instead left his work to speak to us, almost as an accidental by-product.

After all, he did not cure smallpox, discover penicillin, lead his country's army into victorious battle, or indeed perform any of the things that great men are lauded for.

There is a nice little film, called Pen, Brush and Camera.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsNnJLv1pkk

It is clear in this film that he is not that interested in photography, technically, he is not that good. Rather, he was a wannabe artist who adopted the camera, because HE thought that he was not good enough at drawing and painting, but his photographic composition has few equals. In this documentary, he speaks of his reverence for artists, including his uncle, who died in WW1.

Perhaps it is this self effacement, that says much of what one needs to know about the man.

Neither is he alone in this, for instance, the Spanish - Pablo Picasso (Antibes), who claimed at 16 could paint like Raphael, but said it took a lifetime to compose like a child.

Another adopted Frenchman had a similar take on the world around him, Vincent Van Gogh (Arles).

The south of France (Cagnes-Sur-Mer, to be precise) is like that, there is not much triumphalism, but there is a beautiful haze that gets to one, and yields to a diffident anti-authoritarian view of the world.

I remember when I was there, I'm an early riser, and while wifey was snoring her way through the best part of the morning, I would walk a very steep path, cutting off the corners of the winding road until I reached (of all places) McDonalds (I wouldn't darken their doors now), collect my little box of pain-au-chocolat, and croissants, along with a little cup of orange juice... None of your egg or sausage McMuffins in France!

Walking back was all downhill and for most of it, barring a few places where the trees had grown tall, there was a spectacular view of the sea, merging into the sky.

Along the way, there was an abandoned royal blue Fiat Topolino, with the passenger door open and the interior half full of earth and weeds. I have the picture of it on my computer, I used to have a Blogger website, but the holes in my brain (caused by kidney stones) seem to have swallowed the data concerning its whereabouts. I have tried, but cannot find it, perhaps it has been deleted?

[Iain]

What exactly is a “proper biography”? I have the Assouline book and I am not sure what else you could call it. Maybe hagiography?

[Mike Peters]

You're well on your way to being a masterclickbaiter!

[JTK]

This post (and comments) are bound to raise a lot of laughs, so buying the book has to be worth $12.
It is arriving Thursday.

[Pierre Charbonneau]

I have read the original French edition of Pierre Assouline's biography of Henri Cartier-Bresson, "L'oeil du siècle". It was published in 1999 chez Plon. I remember enjoying it.

Many famous photos are told in context of their era. The episode of his american trip with John Malcolm Brinnin is quite revealing about the photographer's personality. And the genesis of the "Vive la France" opus shows the clash of photographic brilliance with the constraints of commercial book publishing.

As I still admire deeply HCB's work, the book brings me to know much more about the man.

[John Camp]

Artists are famous for creating little stories about themselves, or aphorisms thats say something, usually cynical, about art or society. Picasso -- "Bad artists copy, great artists steal." Warhol was the best at it -- look up Warhol on "Brainy Quotes" sometime.. Samuel Clemens was good at it, too, as was Oscar Wilde. It's a way to grasp at some publicity, get people talking about you, without seeming to do it.

As for your clickbait headline, it made me visualize Monroe's ass, which isn't a bad way to start a day.

[Ger Lawlor]

Hi Mike,

I think you'd enjoy Pierre's book; here are two snippets, firstly from the intro and then from the body of the book:

(You'll find the Ghandi photo easily enough on Magnum site)

....The conversation resumed with renewed intensity, though this time it was on condition that I gave him something in return for what he'd given me. That meant that I had to answer his questions. Suddenly, just as I was lifting my cup, he silenced me, looking straight at me for a moment. Then he half-smiled:
'A moment ago you asked me if I still took photographs.'
'Indeed.'
'Well, I've just taken one of you, but without a camera - it's just as good.
The top of your glasses is exactly parallel with the top of the frame behind you - quite striking. I couldn't miss the chance of such perfect symmetry... there, it's done! Now, what were we talking about? Ah yes, Gandhi... did you know Lord Mountbatten?'

/...........

Cartier-Bresson arrived on a bicycle. He had at last been given an appointment. The previous day he had already walked round the outside of the house in order to take in its atmosphere: the poet rather than the film director in search of his location.

On 30 January he was duly admitted. He had already taken photographs of Gandhi supported by Abha and Manu, his two great-nieces, but now he was after more than just a toothless smile snapped from the midst of a worshipping crowd. For a while he watched him receiving a westerner in his kiosk. The two men faced each other, Gandhi apparently doing the talking. He could only be seen from behind, but in fact it was just his hand that was directly visible. The hand seemed to be saying, 'And now what? while the forearm stretched out parallel to a bottle of water. It was a magical composition. A hand can sometimes tell you as much as a face. These fingers, which told a whole story and summed up a whole life, were the last portrait of Gandhi.

(These were just two random pages I opened to find something to comment on, in the reverse order of quotes given - serendipity!)

[Dave]

". . . he conjures Nabokov's musings on the fact that a butterfly collector kills his butterflies . . . "

How does the author find a photograph similar to a killed butterfly?

A "mortified moment", to me, is just a slice of real life. Frozen, but the photographer didn't kill anything.

Even as a metaphor, it doesn't work for me. Life goes on after the photo is taken, not so with the butterfly. A photo may be "dead" compared to real life, but that's as close to death as it gets.

Maybe I'm missing something the author meant.

[Chris Bertram]

I was in a French antique shop a couple of years back, more of a junk shop really, which had old newspapers pasted to the walls. I was amazed to seen an advertisment (1930s) for the products of the Cartier-Bresson family business: cotton thread for sewing.

[Ed Hawco]

I think your first assumed assertion (“… photographs are a way of adoring vitality…”) is incorrect. It is not the PHOTOGRAPHS that adore vitality nor are a way of adoring vitality; it is the person/photographer who adores vitality. In other words, a person sees a moment of vitality and adores it, so they take a photograph, thereby killing (mortifying) it. A bit like “I love my cat, so I will kill it and have it stuffed!”

[John Krill]

At the MOMA book store. Henri Cartier-Bresson: The Modern Century - Paperback is $50.

[Mike Chisholm]

I would treat anything written by Peter Conrad with caution. He is/was prone to bravura flights that tended to leave the boring or inconvenient facts behind on the ground. You'd need to have the book to hand to decide whether what he says is a fair representation of what was actually written by Assouline...

(for a hatchet job on one of *his* books, see https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v02/n14/richard-poirier/peter-conrad-s-flight-from-precision)

Mike

[Moose]

Too Terse Moose apologizes:

Physical book in English, for your $8.

The one I had put in my Abebooks cart was sold before I checked out, probably to another of your readers. Chose another, but there aren't all that many.

[Hendrik]

Well, don't then.

[Sean]

If a world-renowned photographer were to ask an equally famous actress to bless their camera in that manner today, the photographer would have more than his camera buried

[Rob Brodman]

I thought it was cute and accurate according to the article and not just click bait. You're the real deal Mike. Don't fret it.

[Richard G]

I have it. Indifferent would be an understatement.