A busy decade.

The years after World War two were to say the least Busy for Henri Cartier-Bresson.
  In 1946 Henri Cartier-Bresson spent over a year in the USA working on the so-called ‘posthumous’ exhibition of his work, proposed by the Museum of Modern Art in New York at a time when he was believed to have died in the war. Travels in the USA with John Malcolm Brinnin.

Henri Cartier-Bresson/Magnum,
1946. Gelatin silver print

 "His people seem lost or marooned on the city streets' ... Henri Cartier-Bresson's Harlem (1947). Photograph: Magnum Photos

Carson McCullers
and George Davis
Henri Cartier-Bresson
1946

Henri Cartier-Bresson. New York. 1946.

1947: Henri Cartier-Bersson along with Robert Capa, David Seymour (Chim),  William Vandivert  and George Rodger founded the cooperative agency Magnum Photos.   Magnum was and is a cooperative photography agency owned by its members. at the time. Henri Cartier-Bresson would cover India and china.
With the others covering Europe America. Magnum's mission statement was to "Feel the pulse"using photography in the service of humanity, provided widely viewed arresting images of the times. Magnum's projects reflected this with 'People Live Everywhere', 'Youth of the World',  'Women of the World' and 'The Child Generation'.

 Henri Cartier-Bresson, Market in
 the Rue Longue, Marseille, 1954

 Painting By Lu Kimmel  Inspired by
Henri Cartier-Bresson photo above














1948-1950:In the Far East for three years, in India for the death of Gandhi, China for the last six months of the Kuomintang

 Henri Cartier-Bresson 1949 Communist youth rally Shang Hai

and the first six months of the People’s Republic and in Indonesia for independence.











Henri Cartier-Bresson
Balli, Indonesia 1950.

Henri Cartier-Bresson Dutch East Indies present day Indonesia

1952: Cartier-Bresson Has His first book published by Tériade.  Called "Images à la sauvette" the cover is by Matisse.
 

                                                                   
  1954 Publication by Robert Delpire of his book on Balinese theatre, “Les Danses à Bali”, with a text by Antonin Artaud, marking the beginning of a long collaboration with Delpire.

 

 Circus, Moscow, USSR, 1954

                                                                                            
 Henri Cartier-Bresson was the first photographer to be allowed into the USSR during the period of détente in 1954.

                         

Kazansky Railroad station, Moscow, USSR, 1954

Morning at Red Square,
Moscow, USSR, 1954

Sport Day - Moscow Boxing Federation, Moscow, USSR, 1954.

ZiS (Stalin automobile plant) assembly line, Moscow, USSR, 1954

In 1955 Henri Cartier-Bresson has his first exhibition in France at the Pavillon de Marsan in the Louvre, which subsequently travels all over the world. Tériade publishes  "Les Européens"


In 1958 Henri Cartier-Bresson  Returned to China for the tenth anniversary of the People’s Republic of China. Where he undertook a project to photograph the great leap forward, Chairman Mao's Tse-tung's intensive program of forced industrialization. He worked steadily for four months in China, and although he was closely monitored by the authorities, he returned with a larg body of work, rich in Detail The photographs were widely circulated through magazines in France, Germany, Italy, Switzerland , USA. Normally with splashy colour spreads while the photo them selves are all black and white.